Aishiteru
by Melodylink
Summary: A mysterious new employee has a strange interest in Vegeta. Meanwhile, weird things are happening at Capsule Corp. Could the two be connected?
1. sunshine

if you steal my sunshine...

  
"VEGETA!"   
Bulma stormed across the compound towards the gravity room. Various employees wandering around the courtyard recognised the danger signals and hurried to get out of the way of the blue haired genius. However, a young man walking in the opposite direction towards Bulma failed to hide, being new, and not yet understanding what was happening. His arms piled high with paperwork, the unlucky man failed to see Bulma striding along straight ahead of him.   
Crash!   
Bulma scrambled up off the ground where she had been knocked, looking even angrier than she had before, if that was possible.   
"Why the hell don't you look where your going, you fourth rate excuse for an employee!" she screamed.   
The poor man cowered on the ground as he scrambled to pick up the documents his collision had knocked out of his arms. Bulma towered over him threateningly. Steam was practically coming out of her ears. "How dare you be so clumsy! You could have killed someone like that! I can't believe we even let people like you work here at all!   
The man abandoned his search for papers in favour of bowing low on the ground where he crouched. "I'm so sorry, Miss Briefs. I promise you it wont happen again," he stammered.   
"Damn right it wont happen again, you jerk!" she yelled. "You're fired!"   
She looked away from the quivering employee, her eyes narrowing as she caught sight of the gravity room over his shoulder. Without a backwards glance, she stepped around the mess on the ground, and stormed off towards the gravity room.   
Several employees hiding from the Capsule Corp President's rage exchanged glances with each other, and a few kind people hurried over to help the man pick up his papers. The young man appeared to be on the verge of tears, apparently devastated by Bulma's words. A young dark-haired woman who was helping him up noticed.   
"Oh, don't you worry about her," she said soothingly.   
"But she fired me!" he said the edges of tears welling up dramatically in his eyes. "I just started here last week, and I thought I was gonna be so lucky to work at Capsule Corp, and now its all over."   
The woman laughed a little, and patted him gently on his shoulder. "As I said, don't you mind what she said. You won't be fired."   
The man looked at her in bewilderment. "But…you heard her. She said-"   
"Oh Miss Briefs was just upset, that's all. She didn't mean it. You'll have to learn not to go near her when she's in one of her moods. But she never means what she says." The woman gave him a sunny smile. "I bet if you wait an hour or so she will come and apologize to you herself. She always does."   
The man smiled at her hopefully. "You really think so?"   
The woman nodded at him reassuringly. "Trust me, it'll be fine."   
He sighed, a bit theatrically. "Well that's good to know," he said in relief. He smiled at her again. "My name is Jalen," he introduced himself, and looked inquiringly at her.   
"Tshibo Kalika," said the woman, smiling back. "I only started here a few months ago myself, so I know how you feel." She helped the young man to his feet, noting with appreciation as she did so his unusual blonde hair and green eyes. She took in the slender but toned body visible through his thin shirt. "If you like, I could show you around?"   
Kalika waited, then looked at him when he didn't answer, puzzled. He wasnt listening to her, gazing away in the direction Bulma had gone, and a peculiar expression was on his face. If she hadn't just seen him almost in tears, Kalika would have thought he was laughing to himself at some private jest. He noticed her scrutiny, and turned back to her. The weird smile was gone, but there was still something strange way back in his eyes. He smiled at her questioning look and said, his head cocked to one side. "I wonder what made her so angry?" 

* * *

Vegeta paused in his training exercises as he felt the approach of weak ki which he had identified as the onna's. From the flare of her aura, she was mad. Again. Vegeta frowned slightly, but then relaxed. He was just about to finish training now anyway. His stomach was rumbling, and he knew he wouldn't make any more progress until he had eaten something.   
Abandoning his training exercises, he lowered himself to stand lightly on the floor. And just in time, as the gravity was abruptly turned off from one of the outside control units. If he had been in the air, as he was before, the unexpected change in pressure would have sent him crashing into the roof as the force he was straining against was unexpectedly removed. But the onna had caught him that way once before, and he was ready for it this time. With a smooth hiss, the doors to the Gravity Room opened, and Bulma appeared, her eyes blazing.   
"Vegeta!" she yelled.   
Vegeta turned his back on her, pretending to ignore her as he grabbed a towel from the rack and began to rub himself dry.   
"Vegeta!"   
Vegeta continued to ignore her, taking a long swallow of water from his bottle.   
"Hey, look at me when I'm talking to you, monkey-boy!"   
Vegeta smirked to himself. So she really was mad at him. He had noticed that she only used that particular epithet when she was really pissed. He took one last swallow and finished his drink. Slinging his towel round his neck, he made his way to the door of the Gravity chamber. Bulma blocked his way, hands on hips, blue eyes blazing.   
"Just where do you think you're going?" she said angrily.   
"Out," he said, pausing to glare at her.   
"Not until you apologise to me."   
He gave a short laugh. "Apologise? Me? Why the hell should I?"   
"Because my father told me that you just destroyed two of my new robots, that's why!"   
He smirked. "So?"   
"So!" she exploded. "So I just finished making those robots last night! I stayed up all night to make those, and you go and destroy them in the space of an hour!"   
"You made them for me to train with, didn't you?"   
"Yes, but-"   
"Well, I trained with them." He smirked. "It's not my fault that you make such lousy machines that can only last a few measly minutes."   
"I DO NOT MAKE LOUSY MACHINES!"   
"Then why did they break?"   
"You just couldn't be bothered to control yourself long enough to use them properly!"   
Vegeta didn't even bother dignifying that with a response. Instead he phased out, and reappeared behind Bulma. She spun, aggravated "What, his highness cant even finish an argument now?"   
"This argument is finished," he said over his shoulder as he began to walk away. He could feel Bulma's glare boring into his back. Halfway across the courtyard, however, he faltered slightly in his step.   
Something wasn't right His instincts were all suddenly on the defensive. He could feel his body slip into attack mode as he scanned the area, wondering what it was that had alerted his senses. Around him scurried Capsule Corp employees heading towards the staff restaurant for lunch. Around Vegeta though there was a clear space, as the wary employees gave him a wide berth. His reputation as a man to be avoided was even greater than Bulma's, thanks to the man he had blasted on his first week here. Vegeta himself didn't know what they were complaining about. He hadn't even killed the guy. A few weeks in hospital and he could even walk again. What was their problem?   
Frozen in his spot, Vegeta scanned the area, his heart beating faster as he tried to determine what it was that was off balance in this scenario. His nostrils flared. There was something…   
"Vegeta! Are you just going to stand there all day, or are you going to come and have some lunch like a normal person? If that's even possible for you."   
Bulma's voice broke the spell. She had walked past him while he was paused in the middle of the quadrangle, and was waiting at the door to the family quarters, hands on hips, glaring at him. Vegeta glared back at her, his concentration broken, and when he turned back, whatever had caught his attention was gone. He shook his head slightly, and turned away, heading towards the family kitchen after Bulma. But as he turned, he caught a scent in the air, one that tugged lightly at the corners of his mind. Where had he smelt that before? He paused again, trying to put a fix on the strangely familiar scent that wafted past him, but it was gone as mysteriously as it had come.   
He glanced around again at the courtyard, but everything was normal again. A tiny frown tugging at his mouth, he turned and followed Bulma inside. 

* * *

Bulma paused before her chair in the dining room off the kitchen and watched the Sayian Prince devour his food. As always, the way he ate struck her as unusual in comparison to Goku, the only other sayian she had ever watched eat. Unlike Goku, Vegeta ate quickly and neatly, consuming huge portions of food in seconds without dropping or wasting a single scrap, and also without any of the loud eating noises that accompanied Goku on these occasions, though the food disappeared just as rapidly.   
"Where did you learn to eat like that?" she asked, suddenly curious.   
Vegeta looked up from his food, surprise flashing quickly across his face before it was replaced by its habitual anger. "What kind of question is that?" he snapped.   
"Well, its just," Bulma waved a hand vaguely at him. "You have nice table manners for someone who eats at sixty miles an hour."   
He scowled at her, not judging that worth a reply, and returned to his food.   
Bulma watched for several seconds longer, then turned her attention to her own meal. Her mother had made Bulma's favourite lunch for her today - chicken teriyaki with rice, along with a tall glass of raspberry spider. Mmm. Her mouth watered just thinking about it. Even Vegeta, having finished his own feast, was eyeing her meal with thinly disguised hunger.   
However, just as she was about to crunch into it, her attention was diverted by what looked like a flicker of movement at the open window. She stared at the window suspiciously. She could have sworn someone just ducked out of sight as she looked up. She watched for a long moment, then shrugged dismissing the thought, as she turned back to her food.   
Or rather, to where her food had been.   
Bulma stared at her empty plate foolishly for a second. No doubt about it, the teriyaki that she had put on her plate a moment ago was definitely gone. She turned around, to check if she had left it on the benchtop for some bizarre reason, and when she turned back, the straw in her raspberry spider rattled in a suddenly empty glass. 

Bulma's gaze settled accusingly on Vegeta who was seemingly absorbed in catching the last few grains of rice that slid around his bowl. His face was impassive as usual, but there was a smear of raspberry on his chin. Bulma took a deep breath, her face turning red with rage for the second time that morning...   
"VEGETA!" 

* * *

Kalika and Jalen ducked down underneath the window again as the familiar sound of the heir to the Capsule Corp Presidency and her alien houseguest arguing again. With a glance at each other, they both moved away from the family quarters and strolled out over the courtyard.   
"So that's the alien I keep hearing about," said Jalen. "I see what you mean about Ms Briefs and her temper."   
Kalika waved her hand airily. "Oh, she's not so bad. She really is decent most of the time. It's just a few things that set her off. A few months ago, it was that baseball player boyfriend of hers. If one of us girls so much as looked at him, she'd go nuts. These days though, its usually that man you saw in there who cops the brunt of her temper."   
Jalen looked at her out of the corner of his eye. "Yes, I see that. What did you say his name was again?"   
Kalika rolled her eyes. "Its Vegeta. You'll get used to it, Ms Briefs yells it out at least two or three times a day here."   
"How much does everyone know about this man?" asked Jalen, casually inspecting his fingernails.   
"Not much. For all he's so good looking, he's not much for social chitchat. The buzz is that he is an alien, and that's why he's so strong. He spends all his time in that Gravity Chamber, training. "   
"How did he get here?" Jalen pressed.   
"He arrived here a year or two ago, along with all those little green men that were staying here for a while."   
"Little green men? Are they still here too?"   
"No, they left a few months later."   
"And Vegeta didn't?"   
"No, he stayed."   
Jalen stared at the kitchen window thoughtfully. "I would have thought by the way he fights with Ms Briefs all the time, she would have kicked him out long ago."   
Kalika shrugged. "You'd think, but for some reason she didn't. And as far as I know she has no intentions of kicking him out. He lives in the family wing, and eats with them and everything. Its strange, but I think Ms Briefs enjoys having him around, despite all the trouble he causes. Did you know he blasted a man last month?"   
Jalen nodded absently, his mind obviously on other things.   
"It was Mr Haku from Genetics. Poor guy, he had to go to hospital and everything. And all he did was accidentally walk in on him while he was training. Vegeta went berserk."   
Jalen continued to gaze at the kitchen, where he could still make out the outline of Vegeta against the window. He smiled, a spark flaring in his green eyes, and an odd look crossing his face again. He whispered something softly to himself as Kalika prattled on.   
"So I've found you at last … Vegeta no Ouji." 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Hi, Bulma here. Next time on Aishiteru, strange things begin happening around Capsule Corp. Its almost as if we've been sucked into a memory! Find out soon in the next chapter - Yesterday"


	2. yesterday

Chapter 2 - Yesterday

__

"Yesterday

All my troubles seemed so far away…"

Bulma yawned.

The robot that lay on the table in front of her was nearly finished. All it lacked now were a few back up connections to be wired in for some added durability. Not that anything she did would matter in the end, she thought wryly. Vegeta would push these 'bots to their breaking point no matter what measures she took. At least with her new improvements, these ones would last maybe a few days longer. Putting down the tweezers she was using to attach the connections, she stretched her arms above her head. Rubbing shoulders cramped from her stiff position over the benchtop, she glanced at the time and sighed in rueful surprise. It was close to half past three in the morning, much later than she had thought it was. No wonder she was tired. She really had to stop these late night sessions in the lab fixing or modifying Vegeta's damn robots. It was worse than having to fix the dragon radar every time Goku broke it. At least Goku used to get at least a few weeks out of it before it broke. Vegeta broke her robots every couple of days. She really should just refuse to fix them one day. That would serve the arrogant Sayian no Ouji right. Bulma toyed with the idea for a moment, then sighed again. She knew that she would end up fixing them. It was just too important for Vegeta to train for the coming menace for her to not help in any way she could. But that didn't mean he couldn't be a little more polite about it.

Bed sounded terribly inviting. Her late nights had fallen into part of Capsule Corp's routine. Since they had heard news of the androids coming, life at Capsule Corp had fallen into a steady routine. Bulma would stay up late after her work for the company was finished, often working past midnight on personal projects of her own. These days, it was usually to work on Vegeta's robots, modifying and improving as fast as he could break them. Because of this, she often slept until about midmorning, while Vegeta would have been up training since dawn. Because it was closer to lunch time than breakfast when she woke, Bulma usually skipped eating until her mother called her and Vegeta for the noon meal. There, she would have her first argument of the day with Vegeta, which usually woke her up enough for work. After lunch Vegeta would return to training, and Bulma would review the work done that morning by her staff, and work hard at her own jobs. After a late tea, she would return to the lab, free to work on Vegeta's training aides until early in the morning. Then the cycle would begin all over again. Occasionally it varied, as Bulma had a date, or her parents left for a conference in this place or that, but the basic structure remained the same. Capsule Corp had adapted to the sayian prince much easier than she had once thought, in those first few tempestuous days of his arrival. 

But then, that had been while she was going out Yamcha. With Bulma and Vegeta bickered constantly, much to the dismay of the rest of Capsule Corp, with Yamcha around, Vegeta's taunts had been more vicious, with a crueller edge to them. Yamcha too, had been at no pains to hide his dislike and mistrust of the man who had ordered his death, and small grievances quickly became violent. Bulma always hurried to intervene in these and no one had yet been hurt, but it was undeniable that without Yamcha hanging around constantly, Vegeta had relaxed fractionally, and life was smoother. 

Bulma covered her mouth as she yawned again, and decided it was definitely time for bed. She would finish these tomorrow morning. Getting up, she stretched cramped muscles again, and reached over to tun off the light. Pausing at the door to the lab, she ran her keycard through it, activating the alarm system. She slipped the card into her pocket, and typed in the password quickly. The first employee in would turn it off in the morning, a scant five hours away. The security measures employed on the lab were not extreme as it contained nothing of real importance. 

As Bulma walked away, her jacket brushed up against the wall carelessly. She pulled it tighter around her, and headed for her bed on the upper levels of Capsule Corp. 

Behind her, the figure that had waited patiently in the shadows of the hall fingered the keycard he had palmed from the inattentive genius. Once he judged the woman to be sufficiently out of hearing range, he slipped silently forward and ran the card through the panel by the door. Typing in a few key numbers, he was rewarded by a flash of green light, and the doors opened with a hiss. With one last glance around the hall, he slipped inside, and closed the doors behind him. 

..~.. 

Bulma paused as she passed Vegeta's bedroom on the way to her own. The door was shut, as usual, but strange sounds were coming from the room. It was almost whimpering, like someone caught in the throes of a bad dream.

__

I wonder what's wrong? she thought. Her hand hovered over the knob, curiosity as usual overpowering her exhaustion. As she stood there though, a light was snapped on in the room. Before she could turn the handle, the door was flung open. Bulma jumped back, and looked up to meet the angry eyes of Vegeta in front of her. 

"What do you think you are doing?" he snapped. 

Bulma blinked at him, still half stunned from the suddenness of his appearance. That and the fact that he was wearing only a pair of boxes. She swallowed, scolding her mind away from the images that arose unbidden in her head. That was easier when she tore her fascinated gaze from his torso and glanced at his face, which was scowling with more than his usual anger. He looked furious. 

"Well?" he demanded.

Bulma found the shreds of her composure. "I saw your light on," she said tartly. "I assumed you were still asleep, so I was going to turn it off."

Looking at his face, she could tell he hadn't fallen for her flimsy excuse. 

"Look, I'm sorry if I disturbed your highness." She was unsettled enough that her words held more bite in them than she intended. Curiosity fought to prevail, and she made her tone more friendly. "What's wrong? I thought I heard noises. Were you having a bad dream?"

Vegeta's bearing remained angry, despite her effort to be civil. "That is none of your business, woman. As I am obviously not asleep, you may leave. Rest assured I will turn out the light myself when I am done with it." 

Bulma's mouth dropped open. "_I_ may leave? This is my house, monkey-boy. You can't order me around like a servant." The familiar anger began to rise up again, and she opened her mouth to begin yet another fight with her arrogant guest but before she could say anything more Vegeta turned his back on her, slamming shut the door in her face. 

Bulma stared at the closed door, and fought down her irritation. Something was bothering Vegeta for him to act so. In as far as she had learned to judge his reactions since he had taken up residence in her home, her presence before his door had not warranted the anger she had seen him display. Vegeta was troubled about something that had nothing to do with herself. Knowing she would get no information out of him tonight, Bulma turned away from the door and headed up the stairs into her room and crawled into bed. _I'll ask him about it in the morning, _she resolved finally before exhaustion overtook her, and she fell into a deep sleep. 

..~.. 

Vegeta waited tensely as he listened to the faint sounds of Bulma climbing the stairs and entering her room. Her room lay upstairs of his and almost directly above. His sensitive hearing picked out the sounds of her preparing for bed, but he did not relax his stance until he sensed her ki change slightly, as she drifted off to sleep. 

He let out the breath he had been holding in one long slow exhalation of air. He turned back towards his neatly made bed and sat cross-legged on it again. Closing his eyes, he returned to a meditative state. 

Something was wrong in the house tonight – a faint sense of things not being how they should be. He had been wakened a short while before as the turbulence of his dreams became violent enough to jerk him back to consciousness. He had sat up, sweating with exertion and felt the presence of the onna outside his door. Anxious for her not to witness his weakness, he chased her off. More than likely though she would pester him again about it in the morning. Since he had moved in to Capsule Corp he had discovered her curiosity was difficult to balk. Even outright hostility did not alter it. At least she would not disturb him any more tonight. He would just avoid her in the morning until she forgot about it. 

He shook his head almost imperceptibly and returned his concentration to his meditation exercise. He could feel it. 

There was a strange unbalance in the air ways. He concentrated, shaking off the lingering traces of his dream and his annoyance with the onna, and felt an unfamiliar ki moving around downstairs. He was about to press harder and identify it, when a sudden instinct of caution warned him off. Somehow he knew that the being downstairs would sense him if he pressed to hard. A feeling of danger edged into the night and Vegeta withdrew his senses at once. Making his energy as small as possible to avoid detection, he fought the urge to charge down there and destroy the intruder summarily. He was confident he would be able to dispose of the man when the time came, for the moment, he wanted to observe, and see what exactly this strange intruder was up to.

...~... 

Inside the small lab, the figure glanced around, as if double checking that the place was empty. Kneeling down, he withdrew something from his shirt and chucked it on the floor. 

The characteristic poof of an exploding capsule occurred, and the figure leaned back slightly so as to be out of the way of the puff of carbon that accompanied the encapsulated object. When that cleared, a small squat figure was crouched on the floor next to the first. In the gloom of the chamber, the creature looked like a kind of misshapen dog, but with a pair of glowing red eyes that shone through the darkness. The man reached out and snapped something around its neck – a collar of sorts. Tiny lights flashed on it, and it emitted a strange beeping sound. The creature peered up at his master, seeking instructions. The man put a finger to his lips. 

"Wait," he breathed softly. 

He closed his eyes, and slowly extended his senses throughout the house. Above him and slightly to the left was a faint ki signature – the woman returning to her bed no doubt. On the other side of the house were two sleeping ki's, pathetically weak. He scowled in frustration and strained to sense something else. Finally he got it – a tiny wisp of ki that brushed ever so lightly past his senses. He concentrated, and felt it again for a split second, before it eluded his mental search and disappeared. Try as he might, he could not find it again. 

He sighed and relaxed, allowing himself to return to the small room again. The creature was still staring at him with large, unblinking red eyes, its head tilted slightly to one side as if it was measuring him. 

The figure smiled softly and patted it on the head. "It seems our target is more skilled in hiding his presence that I expected. We will have to practice on someone else tonight until I can get hold of him."

He bent down, and taking something out of his pocket, he showed it to the creature, who sniffed it suspiciously. "This is the one you want tonight," he whispered. "Got it? Good. _Now_!"

...~... 

Vegeta felt the man search the house with his mind. Keeping his aura as tight as possible, he observed the man. Once or twice he felt the man's ki brush over his, but it was unable to gain purchase. 

Curiosity was burning in him now. Who was this man who crept into Capsule Corp in the middle of the night? And why did he seem so at home on the mental plane? Vegeta hadn't had to share the mental plane with anyone on Earth since he came to this mudball, save for that clown Kakarrot and the Namek. 

He felt a change, as the man withdrew his senses. All was quiet for a moment, then Vegeta felt a peculiar rushing sound head past him. His eyes widened and he realised that it was not going after him, as he had assumed, but after the onna. Cautiously he extended his senses up to the top floor. He felt the onna stir out of sleep as the thing woke her up. He tensed, ready to barge up there and prevent anything from happening, but almost immediately a strange lassitude filled the room. Vegeta withdrew his senses quickly to prevent getting caught in the mental trap he recognised. After a few seconds, he warily probed the room where they had been before, and encountered…

…nothing. It was as if both Bulma and the strange thing had disappeared. Frowning to himself, he opened his eyes. He had better go up there personally, and see what the hell was going on. 

...~... 

Bulma stirred out of a heavy sleep, and looked around, bemused. She was sitting in a hospital room, beside a white sheeted bed. A figure lay in it, his foot bound up in a cast, and a bandage around his head. She stared at him for a moment blankly, trying to think what she was doing here. The man moved, and groaned, muttering her name under his breath. She started and looked more closely at him. 

__

Yamcha, she remembered in a rush. _It's Yamcha. Of course. He was hurt in the world Martial Arts Tournament, fighting against that Tien guy. This is his hospital room. _

Shaking her head, she went to the adjacent bathroom to splash some water on her face, hoping that would wake her up. As she straightened, she caught sight of herself the mirror above the basin, and felt a moment of shock at her appearance. _When did I cut my hair? _Her blue hair was cropped short, close to her head. A piece of memory tried to tug at her mind, and for a moment, she could see a vision of herself with long curly hair superimposed over her reflection. She blinked, and it was gone. _Strange…_

Back in Yamcha's room, she saw a young boy with black hair bending over Yamcha's bed, apparently checking his pulse. 

"Gohan, what are you doing here?" she asked in surprise. 

The boy looked at her, his face crumpled up in puzzlement. "My name's not Gohan. I'm Goku. Don't you remember me Bulma?" 

__

That's not right, thought Bulma, confused. _Goku is…taller than that…isn't he?_

"Why did you call me by my grandfather's name, Bulma? Did you hit your head or something?" Goku cocked his head to one side, concern showing on his childlike face. 

__

Gohan is Goku's grandfather. Bulma remembered._ Why did I think he was someone else as well for a moment? _Bulma shook her head again._ What is the matter with me? This is Goku. How could I have not remembered that?_

"Sorry Goku, I guess I must have been dreaming or something."

"That's alright Bulma." As Goku smiled his trademark grin, Bulma felt the edges of the unfamiliar memory slip away. 

"I came in here to check up on Yamcha," said Goku. "Hows he doing?"

"I think he is a little better," said Bulma with a sigh, turning back towards the bed. "Not in so much pain anyway." 

"Well, I'm going to fight Tien for what he did to Yamcha," said Goku, an unfamiliar look of determination coming over his face. 

"You better be careful," said Bulma. "He really has it in for you after hearing about how you destroyed that Tao guy."

"I can handle it," he said confidently. "Are you going to come watch me fight?"

"Of course," she said, looking fierce. "I want to see you trash that guy for what he did to poor Yamcha."

"Go get him, Goku." 

Bulma and Goku both spun round to hear a feeble voice coming from the previously silent hospital bed. 

"Yamcha!" 

"Yamcha, you're okay!" Bulma ran over to her boyfriend and hugged him quickly. 

"Hey, careful babe," protested Yamcha. "I'm still sore you know."

"I'm sorry," said Bulma, smiling in relief that he was conscious.

Goku smiled at Yamcha. "I gotta go and warm up before my match," he said. "Wish me luck!"

Yamcha smiled weakly at Goku as he dashed out of the room. "Good luck Goku….you'll need it."

Bulma watched him go, then turned back to Yamcha. "So, are you feeling any better?"

...~... 

Vegeta stared hard at Bulma. She was standing in the middle of the room, her eyes shut. There was no sign of the other creature. 

Something strange was going on. Normally he would just dismiss this foolishness as Bulma perhaps having a weird dream, but there was an unusual feeling pervading the room. Somehow her ki was erased from the room, but she was still alive. 

He looked hard at Bulma as she continued to stand there, transfixed in the middle of the room. On a sudden impulse, he gently pushed his thought out, and encountered a strange barrier around her. He pushed harder, trying to find a way in.

He found it.

...~... 

Bulma was adjusting Yamcha's pillows, when suddenly he opened his eyes again. Bulma was pushed back as he sat up with a force that surprised her. His eyes darted around the room, finally coming to rest on her. Bulma thought she could see a flash of recognition in his eyes, and he lay back slowly.

"Yamcha are you ok?" she asked, a trace of worry creeping into her face. "You really shouldn't be sitting up yet you know."

Uncharacteristically, Yamcha said nothing in reply, but seemed instead to be examining the room for something. 

"Yamcha?" she said, and eyebrow raised. "Yamcha what's wrong with you? You're acting kinda weird." She put her hand on his head. "Maybe you have a temperature." 

He flinched, and Bulma looked down at her boyfriend, puzzled. Maybe his head hurt more than he had said. That was just like Yamcha, not to tell her how much pain he was in in order to spare her worry. She felt a sudden rush of love for her boyfriend. He was so sweet. She took her hand from his forehead, watching him relax now she was no longer touching him. _Poor Yamcha. He's so brave. He must be in so much pain. _

"I have to go," she said aloud. "I'm going to go watch the match. I need to cheer Goku on."

Yamcha scowled, and Bulma interpreted it as a sign of concern for his friend.

"Don't you worry Yamcha," she said firmly. "Goku is going to beat him, I just know it. He'll be fine." She smiled. "You just concentrate on getting better, and everything will be fine."

With that, she leaned over and kissed him.

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Well that was fun, wasn't it ^_^ Next time on Aishiteru, we find out more about the mysterious man and his strange creature, and Vegeta gets a nasty shock of his own. Check it out in the next chapter of Aishiteru! 

Y muchos gracias to Nebula, Bebi-Mara-Jade, Tempest, Piccolo's Love Slave, snowbell101, DBZ Fanfiction Queen and MyStIcSaIyAn45 for reviewing. Love you all ^_^

Oh, I should have said this last time, but I do not own DBZ. Like, duh. 


	3. speculations

Chapter 3 – speculations

(A/N - For all of those who were puzzled, Bulma's memory is from an actual episode of Dragonball. It is set back in the second World Martial Arts Tournament that Goku attended – the one where he met Tien and Chiao-tsu. Yamcha got beaten up by Tien in the first match, and spends most of the rest of the tournament in hospital. I don't think he was really possessed by Vegeta at any point – although we wouldn't be able to know for certain ^_~ For those of you with Pay TV, its actually round about where we are now on Cartoon Network. If you live in America though, disregard that, cause I am of course talking about the Australian programs.) 

Vegeta trained.

He studied the layout of the room carefully. He knew that in the shadows lurked enemies waiting for him, but he could see nothing. He waited, senses attuned to his surroundings. All was still.

Suddenly, there was a faint change in the air pressure behind him. He turned and kicked out smoothly, and a faceless soldier crumpled as Vegeta's foot connected with his neck. The simulacrum toppled backwards and vanished before it hit the floor. As it went down Vegeta caught a faint glimpse of blue hair out of the corner of his eye. He swung round to face it, but it had disappeared. He had no time to reflect on this, because at that moment, a horde of soldiers sprung on him from all sides, attacking him in an eerie, deadly silence. 

Vegeta fought them off, his carefully trained mind blank except for the endless instructions that flowed easily from his brain to his body. Block, block, kick, step, punch, back, punch, block…The computer generated soldiers collapsed silently under his onslaught, only to be replaced by more. Vegeta struck out at the soldier directly in front of him, hitting the nerve endings at the top of the spinal cord, causing it to fall to the ground. He spun round, raising his hand again to deal with the next opponent, and came crashing to a halt. In front of him was Bulma. She stood amidst the faceless soldiers, her head cocked to one side. A faint smile played across her mouth, as if she found him amusing. Vegeta gaped at her, then his eyes widened in pain, as a soldier caught him a blow on his neck. He fell to his knees, his vision going black.

The lights brightened, and Vegeta found himself on his knees in the centre of the gravity room. A screen on the wall above him told him that he had been ejected out of the training program, having failed the mission. Cursing to himself, Vegeta stood up, and grabbed a towel from the rack. He wiped the sweat from his body, then grabbed a bottle of water. He took a long, cool drink, letting the water trickle down his throat. Emptying the bottle, he threw it angrily against the wall. 

Why couldn't he get that girl out of his head? He had fled to the gravity room as soon as the had quitted Bulma's room last night. The sun was now high, and his concentration level was still inexcusably poor.

In the past, during training was the one time when he could successfully forget everything that troubled him. All of the dark spectres of his past that rose up in his mind to haunt him (A/N - cause that's what spectres do right? Haunt people…^_^) would be banished by the intensity of focus he gained. The peace that came from total concentration would envelop him, and he would spend hours here, wrapped in the silence of his own mind. But now the onna had invaded even here, forcing him to break his concentration, and be defeated by a relatively simple program, one that didn't even deal with energy emissions. What was the matter with him?

It was all her fault, he decided. 

He leaned against the wall as the events of the previous night flickered through his mind. Some time in the early hours of the morning, Bulma had been ensnared by the web of a strange creature. It had lured her onto the mental plane and into a trap. Vegeta had tried to penetrate the wall of glamour around her, and found himself drawn into the dream. He had suddenly appeared in her dream, apparently in the guise of that fool Yamcha. 

In actual fact Vegeta guessed that the dream was closer to a memory. Bulma had looked younger, and her hair was cropped short. She had not appeared to have noticed that Vegeta was suddenly impersonating her then boyfriend. Yet he himself had been aware of everything. Frowning, he attributed this to the fact that the trap was spun for Bulma, thus it was only her point of view that mattered. He had discovered he could not enter her memory as himself, and realised why when he appeared. The moments Bulma was reliving had occurred in the past, before she had met him. Therefore it was not possible that he could have materialized as himself because then it would not be true to the memory. Vegeta had encountered traps like this before, and he understood that they followed strict rules. Most tellingly of all that it had been a memory was the chibi Kakarrot that had wandered into his room. By guessing at his age, Vegeta had been able to determine that this particular scene had occurred about ten years ago. 

Once inside the glamour, he had sought to find ways to break its hold over them both. However he found that his actions were circumscribed by the rules of the game. He could make minor changes, such as sit up where Yamcha might have remained lying down, but he could not spring out of bed and blow the chibi Kakarrot to pieces, simply because he was playing the role of Yamcha, and Bulma's mind would not be able to comprehend such a development. So he had been forced to lie there, trying to work out how to break the himself and the onna out of the mind-trap they were stuck in. He ignored Bulma he fussed around him, fixing his pillows and other such foolishness. 

And then she had bent over him, eyes closed. Vegeta was still fuming silently about the reference to chibi Kakarrot, so he wasn't prepared for what she did.

She kissed him. 

Not a passionate embrace, but a warm brushing of her lips against his. He froze, unable to move. It felt like an old lovers kiss, tender and affectionate.

Not that he had any experience with the phenomenon. 

Vegeta groaned. _Why am I even still thinking about this?_ he raged inwardly. _Its not as if she _meant_ to kiss me anyway._

He shook his head violently, trying to chase the unruly thoughts out of his brain though force. He had been so shocked by the kiss that the surprise had jolted his grip on the memory. Abruptly, he had found himself in his own body again, staring at Bulma as she continued to stand lifeless in the middle of her room. He had hesitated, knowing he should wake her up, but not knowing quite how. He certainly wasn't going to enter her head again. 

But in a few seconds, Bulma solved his problem for him by starting awake. He phased out hurriedly before she could become aware of him standing in the middle of her room at some ungodly hour of the morning and reappeared outside her door. He retreated out of the house, and fled to the gravity chamber. Dawn was only a few hours off, after all. He trained vigorously until the suns first light touched the eastern sky. 

It was only then, hours later that he remembered the intruder that had sent him up to Bulma's room in the first place. Cursing, he made a quick sweep of the house, but to no avail. The intruder and its.. creature.. were long gone. 

Vegeta scowled again, and pushed himself up off the wall. It was no good just standing here thinking about it. He should to go and make another search of Capsule Corp. Something told Vegeta that it was vital for him to find out who the midnight intruder was without any more delay. More importantly he had to discover why he was playing around with Bulma's memories. 

~*~

The lunch bell rang. 

Kalika spotted Jalen making his way across the courtyard towards the employee restaurant. She sped up to intercept him. 

"Jalen!"

The tall blond swung round at the sound of his name, and he smiled as he caught sight of Kalika making her way through the press of hungry employees. He stopped to wait for her, and she caught up with him. 

"Hello, Ms Tshibo," he said. 

"You don't have to call me that Jalen," she said with a smile. "My name is Kalika."

A strange expression, almost like sorrow, flitted across Jalen's face. "If its all the same, I don't think I would feel comfortable with that," he said. "You are my superior after all. "

"Nonsense," said Kalika firmly. "We all work together here at Capsule Corp."

"Thank you," he said politely, but Kalika noticed that he omitted to call her by name. 

"What's wrong, Jalen?" she asked. "You seem a bit distant today. Did Ms Briefs apologise to you yet for yesterday?"

"Yes," said Jalen. "She caught up with me in the afternoon, just as you said she would."

"There you are then," said Kalika, smiling warmly. "I told you things are going to be alright."

They two of them lapsed into silence as Vegeta strode past on his way to the family quarters. Jalen watched him go by almost hungrily. Kalika noticed, and wondered for a few seconds if he was gay. That would certainty explain his strange interest in Vegeta, and why he wasn't returning her advances as promptly as she had been accustomed to. 

As she studied his profile however, she decided against it. She had no real proof, and it she would rather not cross him off her list until she was sure. Jalen was just too cute to let slip through her fingers through lack of dedication. 

Even as she stared at him, he turned suddenly and smiled at her, a real smile. 

"Yes," he said. 

"Yes what?" asked Kalika, who had completely forgotten their conversation.

"Yes, you are right." he said, his eyes still following Vegeta. "I think things are going to work out just fine."

~*~

Bulma sat at her desk in her lab, staring at the new blueprints for Vegeta's robots without really registering what they said. Finally, she pushed the papers to the side in disgust. She just couldn't concentrate today. 

Bulma was feeling lonely. It had been a few months now since she had broken up with Yamcha, and suddenly she missed him. She could see him now in her minds eye, laughing at some joke and sharing his ice-cream with her. 

Maybe she should call him. 

Not for a date, of course. No, she didn't want to get messed up in that again. But it would be nice…to just see him for a while. For some reason, the old times with Yamcha were very vivid today. It had been a while now since she had gone anywhere for fun, what with the whole android thing taking over everyone's lives. Maybe Yamcha would stop training long enough to come and have coffee with her. Or lunch, even. There was nothing wrong with lunch. They could go to the old restaurant where they used to go on their dates. 

Not that this would be a date.

Because she was definitely over Yamcha.

Definitely.

Yes.

So it wouldn't _really_ be a problem if they had lunch together at their favourite restaurant and maybe even went to the movies afterwards, because they were not a couple anymore. It would be just two friends, hanging out in a perfectly normal, non-romantic way. 

Bulma groaned and dropped her head down on her desk. She wasn't even fooling herself. She swung around on her chair and gazed out the window. 

The truth was, she admitted to herself, it wasn't Yamcha that she missed so badly, but his companionship. If only there was someone around for her to talk to! All her friends were so busy training for the androids coming that she had effectively lost all her companions in one blow. Bulma worked at Capsule Corp so irregularly that she had never bothered to make more than casual friendships with her colleagues. The z gang had provided enough excitement on their own to leave little room in her life for new friends. 

Bulma sighed and swung back around to her desk. Maybe she should ring Yamcha. All the work that she really had to do was already done. All she was doing here now was playing with some new designs for Vegeta's gravity room. They could wait while she took a personal day. Hopefully Yamcha would be able to take the same view. She was willing to take the chance. Anything would be better than being by herself for another day. 

As her hand hovered over the phone, the door to her flew open. Bulma swung

around expecting to see her father, or one of her colleagues come and tell her it was time for lunch. To her surprise, instead she saw Vegeta enter. He stooped abruptly in the doorway when he saw her though.

"What are you doing here?" said Bulma, surprise showing in her voice. Vegeta had _never_ come into one of the labs before. Usually he oscillated between the kitchen, the gravity chamber and his own room, leaving the rest of the house strictly alone as if he didn't want to trespass on her hospitality any more than he could help. 

He obviously had not expected that she would be in here. He stood stock still in the doorway, like a rabbit caught in the headlights of a car, the surprise written across his face plainly for the brief second before he regained his usual control. Bulma could see him hesitate in the doorway, as if on the edge of leaving. 

"No, wait," she said, unwilling to let only chance at company for the day disappear without at least an explanation to salve her curiosity. "Come in," she added more cordially. "Don't mind me being here. What did you want?"

Vegeta eased into the room, looking more like a strange cat in someone elses yard now as he edged into the room while trying to remain as far away from her as possible. Bulma noticed this, and frowned. "What's the matter Vegeta?" she asked. 

"What do you mean?" he said roughly, scowling at her. 

"I mean you," she said. "What's up with you today? First I hear from my mom that you skipped breakfast, and now you're acting like you're afraid of me."

Vegeta stopped edging around the room abruptly, a dark flush coming to his cheeks. "As if anyone would be afraid of you," he scoffed, but there was an uneasiness lying underneath his words. His eyes watched her warily, as if he expected her to jump up and start attacking him at any moment. 

Bulma let the subject drop, puzzled by his behaviour. 

"So what do you want in here?" she said.

Vegeta did not reply. Bulma let the silence drag out, staring at him until it became clear that she would not let him go without an answer

Finally, Vegeta said curtly, "I'm looking for something." 

"What?" she asked curiously. "All this stuff is mine." A thought occurred to her. "Aren't you missing lunch by being in here?"

He ignored that, and began looking intently at the floor. Bulma looked down as well, but all she could see was the familiar lino pattern that covered the cement that lay underneath. She looked back at Vegeta, who now seemed to be sniffing the air as if he could smell what he was looking for. _Come to think of it,_ thought Bulma wryly,_ he probably can with that sayian nose of his. _

She stared at him, as he stood in the middle of the lab with his eyes half shut. She couldn't even guess what he was looking for. He wasn't paying any attention to the things she had scattered around the lab, but rather seemed more interested in the air. 

Without warning he looked up and saw her staring at him. She opened her mouth to make some smart comment, but the words died on her lips when she caught sight of his face. There was something strange about his expression…

Vegeta flushed even deeper again, which was strange in itself, as she had never seen Vegeta display anything other than anger, detachment, or mocking humour. Now he seemed almost … embarrassed. 

As if sensing her train of thought, Vegeta turned abruptly and left. Bulma sat in her chair, staring at the door, her phone call to Yamcha forgotten. He had left without telling her the reason he had come in or what he was looking for. Even more confusing, he had skipped breakfast this morning, and now it appeared that he would skip lunch as well. That was not like Vegeta at all. 

__

Now what the hell is he up to? thought Bulma. _Whatever it is, I bet I can find out._ She grinned to herself. Suddenly her day seemed a lot more interesting. 

~*~

"Last night went far better than we expected, Remmy," Jalen said to his most unusual pet. Remmy cocked his head at Jalen, as if he wasn't so sure.

"No really," said Jalen, smiling down at him. "I know we didn't manage to get past Vegeta's mental barriers, but the trap you spun for the girl was perfect. I watched it on tape this morning, and from what the readings say, she wasn't even aware that she was dreaming. She thought it was the real deal."

Remmy made a faint rumbling noise. 

"I know, I did record some initial doubt, but the deeper she sank into the induced memory, the less her mind struggled. I'll admit we have never tried this technique on humans before, so I did have some preliminary uncertainties, but last night's experiment proves that humans are most susceptible to mental manipulation. Good work, Remmy."

Remmy purred happily, rubbing his head against Jalen's hand. Jalen laughed, and scratched him obligingly behind the ear for a few seconds before resuming their conversation.

"And you know what was the best bit about last night?" he asked Remmy.

Remmy stopped and looked up at Jalen inquiringly. 

"The best part," said Jalen, relishing the words, "is that Vegeta entered the dream of his own volition."

Remmy cocked his head to one side. He could smell his master's excitement, and he looked inquisitively at Jalen, the question clear in his huge brown eyes. Jalen caught the look and smiled back, his eyes alight. 

"Don't you see, Rem? We couldn't even catch hold of a trace of Vegeta's mind by ourselves. His mental barriers are naturally high, being a saiyan, and this no Ouji has exceptionally opaque ones, no doubt due to his unique childhood. But, while we couldn't even hold him still long enough to identify him properly, when we went after the girl, he let them all down of his own accord to rescue her." Jalen laughed. "He even lost control over his own astral projection while he was in the dream. He couldn't even maintain basic contact."

Jalen grinned at Remmy, raising his voice in excitement. "Its all so easy now. This is how we can go after Vegeta All we have to do is ensnare the girl in another dream-net, wait til he goes after her, and then attack him there, where he is helpless! It's a perfect plan!"

Jalen dropped his voice again, his eyes hardening. "And then, when we have him in our control, we can sift through his mind at our leisure until we find the evidence that we need."

He lapsed into silence, stroking Remmy's head absently as he thought.

Remmy looked up at his master, confused. He could sense the sudden change of mood, and it worried him. Jalen continued to stare out into space, his eyes seeing something that no one else could see. His hand on Remmy's neck was trembling, and suddenly Jalen smelt like old anger. 

"My Alaria," he whispered, sharp sorrow clinging to his voice. "Sweet Alaria. I'll find out what he's done to you." He looked away into the distance. 

"And then I will kill him for it."

Next time on Aishiteru, Jalen and Remmy spin another dream-web for Bulma, but what will they catch instead? Will Vegeta fall for Jalen's plan so easily? And what are the mysterious pair really looking for? Find out next time ^_~

---------------------------------------------------------------------

Lalala. Chapter three finished. It was a bit hurried, so I'm sorry if it sounds a bit rushed, or if there are any mistakes. If you see any please tell me, I hate spelling mistakes almost as much as I do tomatoes (it's a long story )

What did you guys think? As you can see, nothing really happens in this chappie, its just a building point for me to plan the next bit, kinda like chapter one was. I also used one of my favourite words an unseemly amount of times, can anyone guess what it is? Estoy muy perdone for that, but I don't really like to use suddenly that much, and that's really the only other synonym for it. Well, that I like anyway. If anyone can suggest a better one, please do.

Enough rambling. Muchos gracias to Tempest and DBZ Fanfiction Queen for reviewing again. You guys rock ^_~ 


	4. windows

Disclaimer: Hmm, I always forget to say this, but I do not own Dragonball z or any of the characters mentioned herewith. Like, duh :P

**Chapter four - windows**

'My eyes are an ocean in which my dreams are reflected...

-Anna M. Uhlich

Vegeta's relationship with Mrs Briefs was an unusual one for him. 

Breakfast was normally a solitary meal for Vegeta. Bulma was seldom up before midday, and her parents usually ate as soon as they woke. Vegeta always took care to time his entrance until just after the pair had finished. Mrs. Briefs would cock her head to one side and smile at him, setting his breakfast on the table while keeping up a stream of empty-headed chatter. Vegeta submitted to the torture in silence, partly because there was no one to witness his slip in character, but mostly because he had never had anyone talk to him like that in his life. Not submissively, like Nappa would, nor derisively like Zarbon or Ginyu, but someone who just wanted to be friendly. It was a new experience, to be treated like he was just the same as everyone else. Vegeta cherished the blind good nature of his hostess and was determined to keep any thing from ruining her good will. Therefore when Mrs Briefs asked him to fetch Bulma out for lunch, Vegeta had turned without a word to go in search of her, despite the delay in his own meal.

It didn't take him too long to find her anyway. She was standing in the courtyard with another woman and that fool Yamcha. 

Yamcha. Vegeta scowled just to see him. What was he doing here? Vegeta had thought that he was gone for good when the onna kicked him out for the umpteenth time a month or two ago. He felt the hackles on the back of his neck rising as he watched him talk and laugh with Bulma. A stray recollection of last night flashed unbidden before his eyes, and he swallowed, flushing slightly underneath his customary scowl. He controlled the urge to blast the fool to high heaven and walked over to the small group, knowing that his mere presence would discomfort Yamcha enough to make him take his leave quickly, unless the coward was feeling particularly courageous today. Vegeta snorted to himself. Not likely.

As he drew near, Bulma was introducing the other woman to Yamcha, who was staring at her with appreciation. 

"Yamcha, this is Tshibo Kalika. She runs the promotion department in Capsule Corp."

Vegeta heard the introduction without interest. Bulma's friend had no discernable ki level, and did not smell of danger. Plus, the look on Yamcha's face was making him slightly sick. He was about to turn away without acknowledging them at all, when he caught a strange scent in the air. He identified it as the one he had sensed in the courtyard a few days before. This time, however, he recognised it as the faint scent of a flower he knew. 

The scent was radiating off the Tshibo woman that Bulma was introducing. He turned towards the woman, his pulse quickening. He knew that flower, and there was no way he should have been able to sense it here. 

The woman Bulma was talking with was tall, with long dark hair tied demurely in a smooth braid that hung down her back. She was pretty, he supposed, her features regular and unblemished, and her eyes bright. She was dressed neatly, but as casually as Bulma, in a white shirt and dark blue jeans, by which Vegeta identified her as an executive of the company. Only important people, Vegeta had learned, had enough authority to disregard standard uniform codes.

She seemed normal. 

Vegeta stared at her, trying urgently to detect what was unusual about this woman, and how she could possibly smell like a flower long since crushed out of existence. 

Feeling his eyes on her, the woman turned. Soft dark brown eyes met his own. Vegeta seized the opportunity, and probed deeper, lightly brushing aside the barriers that were around her mind, trying to discover who she was. His eyes widened at what he found, and he withdrew his tiny sliver of consciousness hastily, carefully smoothing over the place he had touched with his mind. She relaxed as he rubbed the memory of his intrusion away, and was now staring at him curiously.

As was everyone else. The whole group had noticed the interaction between Vegeta and Kalika, and had stopped to observe. Vegeta could feel Bulma's eyes boring into him from behind without even turning his head. 

Keeping his face carefully expressionless as always, he turned away from the group without a word and stared out into the distance. The group stared at him for a while longer, until the sudden surprised silence was broken by the appearance of Bulma's mother, come to find out why Vegeta had not brought back her daughter yet. Yamcha took advantage of the situation, and escorted Kalika away to the employee restaurant, leaving Vegeta relieved that he would not have to sit though a meal with that fool present. Bulma turned to go in with him, and he could feel her staring thoughtfully at him still.

As he returned to the Briefs kitchen however, Vegeta's mind was far from the blue haired woman beside him. Instead, Vegeta was immersed in memories. He wondered wryly at the strange twistings of fate. He had thought never to see _her_ again. She looked different now, which was why he had not recognised her from the first. 

She didn't remember him. Indeed, it had been so long now, he had all but forgotten her. And yet they had both turned up on the same mudball, in the same house even, against all the odds of ever meeting again. It was almost enough to make him believe in some kind of universal justice.

Almost.

That night, Jalen sat in front of a monitor he had borrowed from work and looked over at Remmy. "Are you sure you understand what you need to do?" he asked.

Remmy growled an affirmative. Jalen looked at the monitor and then back at Remmy again uneasily. "We've never done it like this before. I think I will go over it one last time, just to make sure we've got it right."

Remmy rolled his eyes, but did not complain. 

"Now, firstly, you need to catch Ms Briefs in a mind trap. It doesn't matter what sort, just a memory of some kind. A more recent one would be preferable, from no less than three months ago. Hopefully that will encourage her mind to adapt to it as quickly as possible. We know that Vegeta is watching over her, he will be ready for this. Most likely he will first try and find where we are. The way he jumped out of the dream last night implies that he will not be overly eager to enter her consciousness again," Jalen laughed quietly. "Of all things, Vegeta does not like losing control. When he comes looking for us, that's when I want you to cast the dream I prepared earlier at him. It's very subtle, more of a suggestion, then a full blown fantasy. If that works, he should be forced to enter into the woman's dream, thinking her in danger." Jalen paused, and looked intently at Remmy, making sure he was being understood. Remmy gave a little chirp, and Jalen went on. "Give him five minutes or so to let him get settled into the dream," he instructed, "then jump from Bulma's mind into Vegeta's. "

He looked hard at Remmy. "Now, this is very important. If you can, you need to try and confine his memories to ten years ago, and a planet named Athus. It has red dirt and not many buildings. Vegeta's subconscious should be able to supply the rest of the memory. Don't let him wander off track. This is very important. If you lose control, we might never find what we came here for."

Jalen took the collar from the desk beside the monitor. "I will be recording everything that happens from here," he said as he snapped it around Remmy's neck. "If you feel like you are losing control, tell me, and I will disconnect the traps."

He adjusted a few of the faintly glowing knobs on Remmy's collar, then sat back. 

"Are you ready?"

Remmy looked steadily at his master.

"Good," said Jalen. "Lets do it."

Vegeta retreated to his room early that night to escape Bulma. It seemed like every time he had turned around today, she was there, watching him thoughtfully with that speculative expression on his face. It was driving him nuts.

Vegeta shook his head, trying to rid himself of the errant thoughts that had plagued him all day. A tiny voice whispered traitorously in the back of his mind that perhaps Bulma wasn't the only one who was having trouble concentrating. He scowled, his ki flaring for a second before he calmed himself. _No good thinking about that now, _he scolded himself. Time enough later to think of that. 

He settled down. He had to try and find the intruder tonight. Vegeta had failed to find anything but lingering traces of the strange creatures despite searching all day. They were purposely covering their tracks, which led Vegeta to believe that the intruders would try again. 

He felt Bulma settle down into sleep above him, and became alert, waiting for the creature to make its move. He extended his senses very slowly, searching for the strange traces that meant a mental trap was being sprung. He pressed slowly down towards Bulma's personal lab, sure that they would be there again. However, when he got there, he found nothing. He waited for a moment, unsure of where to go from there, when he felt a rushing sound go past him. Vegeta swore, and turned to follow it. It must have been waiting for him to drift away from Bulma before it attacked. Faster than thought, he raced up to Bulma's room, but he was too late. Her ki signature was already erased, and she was obviously deep in the throes of a mental trap. 

There was nothing else for it. Taking a deep breath, Vegeta pressed forward slowly, once more entering Bulma's head. 

Bulma was beginning to be really mad at Yamcha. They had been standing out on the lawn of Capsule Corp arguing. Or, rather, she was fighting with him, and he was trying to fend her off. Ordinarily, when Yamcha was contrite enough, she would take pity on him and take her anger out on someone else. He was her boyfriend after all.

But today her temper was at the breaking point and she was attempting to work out her frustrations on the nearest object. Yamcha's jelly-fish-like cowering was irritating beyond belief. She was in a bad mood, and wanted desperately for a good fight to clear the air, but Yamcha was stubbornly refusing to respond to her taunts. She summoned up her last reserves in a vain hope that something would provoke him sufficiently for him to wake up and fight properly.

A group of girls walked past, giggling and waving flirtatiously at Yamcha. He smiled at them in response, waving back. Bulma pounced. 

"There you go again, flirting with everything in a skirt. I can't believe you! You don't even care if I am here or not! "

Yamcha's eyes widened, and he waved his hands desperately. "No, babe, I didn't mean it like that-"

"Don't you _dare_ call me babe! _Most_ people would at least have the decency not to flirt with girls until their girlfriends are gone!"

"But I-"

"Tell me, are you going to have them all at once, or do you plan on savouring them one at a time?"

"What makes you think I haven't had them already?"

Bulma paused mid-tirade, staring at Yamcha in shock. He was watching her with a suddenly challenging expression on his face. 

"What?" she faltered.

He smirked. "Are you hard of hearing? Or perhaps it is your brain that is impaired."

Bulma's eyes widened, then flashed red with anger. "How _dare_ you!" she practically screamed. "I let you into my home, I feed you and clothe you at no expense to myself, and this is what I get in return?"

Yamcha scowled at her. "You don't feed me, you're parents do. Therefore, I don't see that I have a responsibility to pander after your every frivolous whim."

"This is NOT your home! You do not belong here!" Bulma screamed, then faltered when Yamcha didn't reply. She looked up to meet his dark eyes, and was caught.

Yamcha's usually mobile face was now blank, but his eyes were filled with a peculiar kind of anguish. She took a step forward, drawn by the incredible desolation. For an instant, Bulma glimpsed pain and loneliness fighting for supremacy in his dark eyes, open and frighteningly defenceless; and in the next instant they flashed in the light, and he was no longer vulnerable.

She stared at Yamcha, her mind reeling. That wasn't Yamcha. He might look like her boyfriend, and sound like her boyfriend, but suddenly Bulma was sure that she was standing in front of a stranger. She couldn't say what she had glimpsed for a moment inside the man who looked like her boyfriend. It was something that Bulma would never forget, something that couldn't be described even to herself. Somehow, while she was looking in his eyes, she had slipped inside his soul for a moment. And his soul was filled with pain. 

His face was unemotional now, with nothing lingering in his eyes but anger. Bulma stared at him, trying vainly for another glimpse of what she had seen before, but the wall was back in place. Yamcha was now looking at her warily, distrustfully, an expression she had never seen on his face before.

"You're not Yamcha."

Her boyfriend glared at her. "You noticed."

"But then who are you?" Bulma asked desperately, then hesitated as the memories came rushing back. "…I know you…don't I?"

The man who looked like Yamcha had turned away, pretending to ignore her as he scanned the horizon. Bulma however could see the muscles in his arm were tense, as if he were on edge waiting for her conclusion. She took a step forward and caught his arm, tugging him around to look around at her, his dark eyes boring into her own.

His dark eyes…

Memories flashed before her mind. His dark eyes glaring at her, demanding she give up the dragonballs. His dark eyes crazed with battle lust, triumphant and gloating as he stood over the body of her friend. His dark eyes mocking her, baiting her, playing a game of one-upmanship she could never back down from. His dark eyes, filled with horror and self-loathing in an unshielded moment. His dark eyes, burning with anger that she would trespass on his mind.

"Vegeta," she breathed. 

Some unidentifiable emotion flashed across Yamcha's face, gone almost before Bulma could register it was there at all. Was it fear she saw? Surprise? Or something else? He opened his mouth, and looked as if he were about to speak when the world flickered. 

Bulma blinked, suddenly disorientated as her surroundings went out of focus. Rainbow colours swam before her eyes for a second and she felt her stomach turn uneasily as the ground beneath her feet lurched. Losing her balance, she fell to the ground, hitting the red dirt hard. She looked up at Vegeta, who had abandoned whatever he was going to say, and was now watching the horizon with a taut expression on his face, his body compensating easily for the motion of the ground. 

Warned by his wary expression, Bulma looked around as well, and was dazed to see that their surroundings had changed. Gone were the green openness and white buildings of Capsule Corp. The two of them were standing in a desert. Red dirt stretched as far as the eye could see, unbroken by buildings or structures of any kind. Dark smoke clouded the horizon, and the air had a sharp taste to it, like rusted tin.

Bulma tasted it on her lips and went cold. She knew that smell. She had smelt it before, on the bodies of her friends, and on the slaughter fields of Namek.

Blood. 

Bulma pushed herself trembling to her feet and stared around slowly, afraid of what she might see, but nothing distinct was visible through the smoke. Alas, she was not so lucky about the noise.

Bulma shivered uncontrollably at the sounds. Screams and cries and wails coiled and recoiled in the still air, filled with such anguish and pain as she had never heard in her life. She sunk to her knees, biting her lip to keep from crying. A confusion of tongues and monstrous accents toiled in pain and anger seemingly just out of sight. Voices hoarse and shrill were mirrored by sounds of blows striking flesh. Soundless tears rolled down her face. This was a terror she had never felt before. Surrounded by pain and torment, the horror-filled screams that rent the air destroyed what wits she had left.

A touch on her shoulder. Bulma flinched violently, and looked up. Vegeta was standing above her, a strange expression on his face.

"We must go. Now."

Bulma tried to push herself to her feet, but her legs would not hold her. She collapsed to the ground again, whimpering. "I can't get up."

Vegeta grabbed her arm unceremoniously and was about to pull her roughly to her feet when he stopped suddenly.

Bulma looked up in surprise, and saw his face go ashen under its tan.

"What is it?" she said 

Vegeta said nothing, staring at something she couldn't see through the smoke. 

"Vegeta! What's wrong?!"

He didn't even look at her, still staring at something in the distance with the impassive expression that Bulma had come to recognize as Vegeta hiding emotion. She made another effort to get to her feet, energized by the terror of the situation. She tugged at his arm again, trying to get him to move. 

"Come on Vegeta, there's no time for this. You have to help me get out of here!"

At last he turned and looked at her bleakly. "We can't now," he said calmly. Shaking off her hand on his arm, he faced back the way he had been staring, something indefinable in his eyes. 

"It's too late."

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Hiya guys! Next time in Aishiteru, something drastic has gone wrong with Jalen's plan. Vegeta and Bulma are in for some trouble as they try and find a way out of the dream-trap Remmy has woven. Will they make it? Find out in the next chapter of Aishiteru ^_^

To scoured_earth, snowbell101,Tempest12, DBZ Fanfiction Queen, MyStIcSaIyAn45, Bebi_Mara_Jade, DBZ-fan-JESS and Lilac Cherry Blossoms; Thank you so much for reviewing ^_^ Sorry this wasn't up sooner, but my lazy act kicked in, and I spent the weekend partying in Orange instead of writing *cowers in shame* Won't happen again. Next chapter should be up in a few days. Stay tuned !


	5. blood

Chapter five – blood

__

I saw my evil day at hand. The sun rose dim on us in the morning,

and at night it sank in the dark cloud, and looked like a bowl of fire.

****

~ Black Hawk

Vegeta suppressed a shiver that had nothing to do with the temperature. He could see nothing through the smoke, but it was impossible not to pick out the unmistakable sense of an all too familiar ki on the horizon, one that was like a cold metal tang inside his mouth. Somewhere deep inside his mind was screaming at him, but now, nothing was real except the icy knowledge that _he_ was here again, back to finish what he started. 

He had recognised the battlefield with a sinking feeling in his heart. The red dirt, the smoke filled air, the screams – all of them were etched in his memory more clearly than any other planet he had been to. This had happened before. The presence of the powerful ki in front of him was confirmation of his fears. He knew what was coming next, and there was no way he could stop it. 

Someone was tugging at his arm. Vegeta shook the sensation off irritably, still focused on the approaching menace. 

__

Frieza. 

The name echoed around his head, calling out old nightmares brought to life. Memories of pain and humiliation mixed with dread of the all to predictable future, blurring his mind with icy fear. The presence beside him tugged again, harder. Vegeta spun round hand raised to knock the unwelcome interference away, then hesitated. It was a girl. 

No, not a girl. A woman, with blue hair and fear written in her eyes. 

"Vegeta, what are you doing?" she screamed at him.

__

Who is she? he wondered. _What was she doing here?._ A sense of displacement grew in his mind as the woman tugged harder at his arm again_ This isn't right. I've seen her before somewhere…but where?_

She looked desperately into his eyes, urging him to do something. Not move. He couldn't move. _He _was coming for him, and all Vegeta could do was wait. So why did the strange woman want him to move? 

Vegeta opened his mouth to tell the woman to get lost, when he was arrested by her eyes. Deep blue eyes…

"Bulma!" he said suddenly.

Bulma looked irritated. "Who did you think it was, baka? Stop stuffing around! We have to get out of here!"

Bulma. Vegeta stared at her as the memories rushing back. How could he have forgotten? 

The onna who had offered him a home at Capsule Corp. They had been arguing, no, fighting in front of Capsule Corp. He had been that fool Yamcha. Then the world had changed, and they were here.

This wasn't real – this was just a dream. He looked around, sensing the presence in the distance, and also three more ki levels, much closer and tinged with the red of blood lust. For a moment he tried to will himself out of the sequence, but to no avail. It seemed as if he would just have to play along with this little dream-trap for now. But that didn't mean it had to go the way he remembered it. He was much stronger now then he had been then. A smirk curved his lips, and he flared his ki, ready for a fight. . 

As if in answer to his thoughts, an energy beam shot out of the smoky darkness towards him. Vegeta snapped his head to the side, and it barreled past him to be lost in the darkness. It was immediately followed by a flurry of blows from the first of the three fighters. Vegeta pushed Bulma roughly, the force sending her sprawling to the ground out of his way. With her clear, he could use both hands to defend against the sudden attack. As he was preparing to beat the shit out of the soldier in front of him, a soldier attacked him from behind, drumming a tattoo of blows into his kidneys and spine. 

Vegeta leapt into the air and spun, his foot slamming into the throat of the attacking soldier. The man behind him attempted to jump into the air as well in order to meet his attack, but Vegeta was down on the ground beside him before he could take off to gain the added advantage of fighting in the air. Vegeta caught a blow headed towards his stomach, and twisted the man around by his arm, going down on one knee and to drive his elbow into his solar plexus The man staggered, then lunged forward to grab Vegeta's neck in a fatal chokehold. Vegeta pulled his arms down to his side as he surged forward, kneeing him painfully in the groin. This sent him stumbling backwards, gasping in pain. Before he could recover, Vegeta leapt and span in the air again to land a solid kick to the side of his head. The man collapsed like a pole-axed steer. Vegeta darted back from him warily, in case he was merely faking unconsciousness, but the challenge of a fight was pumping adrenaline now through his body, and it felt good. 

A cry came from Bulma's direction. Vegeta spun around to see a third fighter with a choke hold on Bulma's neck. She was struggling desperately, but the fighter's superior strength held her in place easily. Her eyes were turned towards him with a hopeless expression in their blue depths. Vegeta started forward with an oath to deal with the soldier when he felt a blow to the back of his neck that drove him to his knees. He rolled as he hit the ground, and came up to see the man he had left behind on his feet, blood oozing from the side of his face where Vegeta's steel-capped boot had hit. Before Vegeta had regained his balance, faster than light the man punched him in exactly the same place, putting the whole force of his body behind it. Vegeta hit the ground with force, displacing earth and rock as he drove into the ground. As he gathered himself to rise, agony lashed through his face and it felt as if the fighter had shattered his cheekbone. _There is no pain_ he told himself, driving his mind to channel away the discomfort until after the battle. He saw the fighter approaching to finish him off, and instinctively went into a tuck position. He grabbed hold of the fighter's arms as he leant down and used his feet to propel him over himself and onto his back. Vegeta rose onto one knee, and fired a small shot of ki that hit the fighter in the stomach. The man collapsed, blood coughing out of his mouth, and died. Vegeta let himself breathe for a moment, when am image of Bulma sprung to his mind. He whirled around. The third man had dragged Bulma a little distance away, and now had the woman on the ground, groping viciously at her waistband. Bulma was trying ineffectually to beat him off with her arms, but he simply batted them away. When a chance blow caught him on the cheek, he grabbed her hands and pinned them above her head, ripping the flimsy fabric of her shorts from her body his other hand. 

A red mist covered Vegeta's eyes at the sight, and he sprang towards the pair faster than thought. With one blow, he kicked the soldier on the chest, forcing his neck to snap back with the sickening sound of crunching bone. Another savage kick tossed the now limp body away from Bulma's quivering form lying helpless on the ground. 

Bulma's eyes were screwed tight, and fat tears rolled down her cheeks. Angry red scratches were visible down the side of her face, and on her legs and stomach where the fighter had ripped away her shorts. Her lower clothing was in shreds, and Vegeta felt a strange twisting inside as he looked at her injured form. The sight of her bruised and violated body triggered a reaction inside his head. For a moment, he could see another vision superimposed over Bulma. A small dark haired boy, curled on his side, trembling with fear and shame. 

He crouched down beside her, carefully avoiding touching her as he waited. She didn't move, almost rigid on the ground with terror. Precious seconds passed, and Vegeta could hear more of the rampaging soldiers draw closer to their position. Common sense told him that he should leave the girl and get the hell out of here. The fighters that were coming were above average, and while he could handle them, they had numbers in their favour. It was putting himself in serious danger to remain here. Yet still he waited, unmoving beside the shivering body of the blue haired woman. His instincts screamed at him to run, but another deeper instinct told him it was more important for him to stay. His mind flickered back, an unpleasant memory that lay just out of reach. Of crying, alone in the dark, shame clawing at him in a way that somehow hurt more than the marks on his body. 

His mind flinched away from the memory, and he was suddenly aware that Bulma had relaxed. Her eyes were open now, and she was looking at him, terror still etched on her face. 

"Are…is he gone?" she asked him, her voice barely more than a whisper. He nodded slowly. She sat up, her hands going protectively to the remains of her clothing, trying to cover herself back up. Vegeta stood and turned away, using his senses to detect the presence of the enemy. They were close, perhaps too close for them to escape. 

"Get up," he said to Bulma over his shoulder. "We must leave now."

Bulma struggled to her feet, warned by the underlying current of tension in his voice. However, as she stood up, her pants fell down. With a squeal, Bulma tried to pull them up again, but the flimsy cotton of her shorts had been ripped like paper by her assailant. Vegeta watched her efforts for a moment, then scowled in frustration. Modesty was not something they could afford right now. He was uncomfortably aware of the familiar ki on the horizon. 

Striding over to the body of the dead soldier, he stripped the loose pants from his body, and offered them wordlessly to Bulma. She recoiled as if he had handed her a snake. 

"What are you doing?" she exclaimed.

"Change into these."

"I'm not wearing those!" she said disgustedly. "They've got blood on them."

"Its either that or you go as you are," Vegeta told her impatiently.

Bulma tried once more to adjust her shorts so that they covered her body decently, then gave up and grabbed the pants Vegeta still held out towards her. She stood there, holding them at arms length as if she was afraid they would bite her. Vegeta glared at her.

"Why are you just standing there? Did you lose your wits as well as your pants?"

"I am not wearing a dead man's clothes!"

"At the moment, you are not wearing anyone's clothes. Fastidiousness is a luxury. Hurry up and change, onna. We must leave."

Bulma went red. "Well I'm NOT getting changed with you here!"

Vegeta looked at her scornfully. "I suppose you think it is a better idea for me to leave so more soldiers can come back and finish the job." He snorted. "Fine, then, if that's what you want." He turned and made as if to leave.

Bulma flushed. "I didn't mean that!" she said. "Just… at least turn around or something, okay?"

Vegeta scowled at her until she made it clear that she wouldn't move until he turned around. Rolling his eyes at what he saw as an illogical waste of time, he turned around and studied the horizon. Behind him he could hear Bulma rip the rest of her shorts off and throw them away. He felt a sudden urge to turn around. Memories of her body as he had seen it that quick second as he disposed of her attacker flashed before his mind, and he flushed slightly, glad that Bulma couldn't see him. Ruthlessly he squashed his unruly thoughts, and concentrated instead on searching for any ki signatures within his radius. Away to the north he could feel the presence of a small band of fighters, their aura's tinged with blood lust. They were approaching rapidly, and Vegeta cursed the delay. The two of them should have been out of here as soon as he had killed the third fighter. Now, the soldiers were possibly too close for him to be able to avoid confrontation, dragged down as he was by the presence of Bulma. 

Vegeta's eyes narrowed as he thought rapidly, then he gave a mental shrug. What happened here could not hurt him, as long as he remembered that this was a dream. He would have to keep the onna with him in order to retain his memories. Vegeta was still dismayed to realise how close he had been to succumbing to the suggestions of fear in the memory. No, he couldn't leave Bulma behind now, lest he lose control over his mind completely. A tiny voice in the back of his mind whispered that maybe he had another reason for keeping her close, but he ignored it. 

The sense of Frieza's presence was still on the horizon. Vegeta decided to avoid that confrontation at least. He was much stronger now than he had been, but something told him he wasn't ready to meet Frieza again just yet. 

Vegeta turned again to see Bulma, decently clothed now, even if the pants were way to big for her and the rip in her shirt caused it to hang open at the neck, displaying a pretty white shoulder. Bulma noticed his gaze, and self consciously pulled her shirt up so that it covered her upper arm. 

"Well, are we going to get out of here, or what?"

For reply, Vegeta picked her up and flared his ki, taking off swiftly into the sky. Bulma squealed at the suddenness of it, her arms reflexively clinging to his neck tightly. Vegeta sped up, and her arms spasmed, almost choking him.

"Stop that," snapped Vegeta. "I wont drop you."

Obediently, loosened her death hold a little bit, so he could at least breathe properly. Her eyes were squeezed shut, and he noted with satisfaction that her shirt had slipped down again, and was dangerously close to falling off altogether. He smirked. So much for modesty. 

~*~*~*~

Jalen swore.

"We almost had him!"

It was frustrating. Vegeta had been so close to succumbing to the mind-trap when the presence of Bulma in her present-day form had triggered his memory. Now, Vegeta was aware of the trap, and it most probably wouldn't be long before he figured out a way to break free. Jalen sat in front of the monitor, his hand hovering over the disconnection switch. Something was definitely wrong with his plan. Remmy had confined Vegeta to the world of Athus, but his physique had not changed. Vegeta's morphic memory should have asserted itself once he was inserted in the timeline, but the no ouji still appeared to be his adult self.

It was that damn woman, he decided. Bulma had somehow managed to follow Vegeta as Remmy had jumped to his mind. While she was still with him, it would be impossible for Vegeta to be completely taken into the dream, for she would act as a constant reminder that what passed was not real. No, they had to find a way to separate the two of them, or Vegeta would break free of the tenuous grasp Remmy held over his consciousness before they had the evidence they needed. 

Jalen looked over at Remmy, who was staring into nothing with an intent expression on his dog-like face, concentrating on the mind link he was maintaining with the saiyan. If only the woman would stray far enough away from Vegeta that he could disconnect her from the mind-trap. 

"Remmy, can you hear me?"

A long ear twitched in acknowledgement, the creature being too preoccupied with his mental labours to spare time for a proper reply. 

"Listen. That damn woman is triggering his memory. At this rate, he is going to will himself out of the dream before he finds Alaria. You need to find a way to separate them. Can you do that?"

Remmy's expression grew pained, but he flicked an ear in affirmation anyway. 

"Good boy," Jalen said warmly. "The sooner we do this, the sooner we can find out what he did to Alaria. That is all that matters."

~*~*~*~

Vegeta alighted in a clearing beside a small brown creek a safe distance away from the battle. He dropped Bulma unceremoniously on the ground as soon as his feet touched the earth. She scrambled to her feet, annoyed at his manner and opened her mouth to berate him again, when she caught sight of his cheek properly for the first time. 

"Vegeta, what happened to your face?" she said instead, appalled. His cheek was lacerated where the soldier had hit him, and blood was dripping from his jaw to soak into his uniform. Vegeta looked round at her, then raised his hand to touch his face, as if he had only just realised he was hurt. Scowling, he wiped his arm across his cheek to mop up the blood, unable to control a grimace at the pain of touching it. 

"You have to clean that or it will get infected." Bulma looked around helplessly for a moment, then reached down and tore a strip of fairly clean cloth from the bottom of her shirt. She blushed when the rip went a little too high, but now wasn't the time to be concerned about that. Running over to soak the cloth in the creek, she returned and went up to Vegeta, raising her arm to his face to try and clean it.

What happened next came to fast for her to register. Vegeta caught her wrist before it had even travelled halfway. His fingers tightened, and she dropped the cloth with a cry. Abruptly he released her, and caught the cloth before it could fall in the dirt. Shoving her slightly, he stepped back.

"What the hell do you think you are doing?" he said, anger in his voice.

"What is the matter with you?" said Bulma, irritated. "I was going to try and clean that cut on your cheek."

Vegeta scowled. "Dont touch me, onna," he said curtly. "I can take care of myself."

"No, you can't," said Bulma. "Your cheek needs proper cleaning or it will get infected, and you can't do that without a mirror. Which, may I remind you, we are in short supply of right now."

The sound that came out of Vegeta's throat was close to a growl. "I can take care of myself!" he said loudly.

"No, you can't!" yelled Bulma back at him. "Now swallow your stupid pride and let me help you."

"I don't need your help!" 

Bulma sighed exaggeratedly. "Fine, Mr Independant. Consider it as returning a favour then."

"For what?" he snapped, clearly still suspicious.

"For saving my life back there, baka! Or has the injury muddled your brains so much that you dont remember our little scuffle with the soldiers." 

Vegeta fell silent, his eyes narrowed as he stared at her. Bulma brought herself to meet his gaze, determined she would win this fight. Their eyes met in a contest of wills, and Bulma was startled to see the emotions battling in his dark eyes. She maintained the gaze while marveling to herself that anyone could ever describe Vegeta as unemotional. His face was as expressionless as ever, but the depth of fire in his eyes was breathtaking.

Carefully, without breaking eye contact, she reached forward for the cloth. He let her take it this time without argument. Reminded of why they were fighting, she tore her gaze from his, and concentrated on his injury. The abrasion on his face was large, and Bulma was alarmed to see dirt embedded in the wound, along with a mass of dried blood. She found a clean cloth, and gently applied it to his face. She looked up at him swiftly, expecting an exclamation of some kind. The alcohol must have burned his hand cruelly, but he didn't make a sound. Obscurely encouraged by his silence, Bulma gingerly began dabbing at the laceration, trying to clean away most of the dried blood and dirt. A muscle jumped in his cheek, but otherwise he made no sound. Bulma felt her respect for the saiyan go up a notch. Yamcha would have been rolling around on the ground screaming by now. Vegeta merely sat there, apparently ignoring the pain as he stared into her eyes.

She finished cleaning it, and, satisfied that infection would not set in, she rinsed out the cloth in the creek. Coming back at last, Bulma looked up again and saw that his eyes were still on her. There was an indecipherable expression on his face. 

She looked down at the ground, then back up at him. "Thank you," she said softly. "For saving me back there. I..I thought that he had…that he would…"

Vegeta cut her off by reaching out and touching her face, lightly tracing the long scratches left by her assailant. Bulma shivered under his touch, then scolded herself for reacting so. 

When he finally spoke, his voice was low and unusually soft. "He didn't."

"I know." 

Vegeta continued to stroke her face, and Bulma could not control the shiver this time. His fingers were warm and soft against her skin. Bulma wondered about that fleetingly, then remembered his ever present white gloves. She could feel her heart thudding in her chest as he gazed at her, his eyes a mix of curiousity and something else. Impulsively she leaned into his caress, stepping forward closer to him.

"Well, isnt this cozy," came a cold voice from behind them. 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Oh-oh! Next time in Aishiteru, Bulma and Vegeta get split up, which does not bode well for Vegeta's memory. Will Vegeta be able to maintain his mind, or will the dream drive him crazy? And will we finally get to meet Alaria? Find out in the next chapter of Aishiteru. ^_^

Yay! Two chapters in two days ^_^ Special thanks to outtadaloop, DBZ Fanfiction Queen Bebi_Mara_Jade and Lilac Cherry Blossoms for reviewing the last chapter. Here's the next one for you. Expect chapter six on Wednesday ^_^ Til then, hasta luego!


	6. separation

Chapter Six – Separation

"I've had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it."

~ Anonymous

His first thought was that Frieza had found them, and when Vegeta jerked his head up to look around him, he saw that he hadn't been far wrong. The two of them were surrounded by troops wearing Frieza's uniform, but the leader of the small band was a tall human-looking young man Vegeta did not recognise. It was he who had addressed them, and he continued to walk around Vegeta and Bulma, as if he were examining an exhibit at a zoo. Vegeta twisted around so that he stood with his back the onna. He could feel her trembling, though she was smart enough not to make a sound.

Vegeta sized up the quality of the escort with a scowl. As far as he could tell, close to thirty of Frieza's crack troops stood in fighting positions around the clearing. On the bright side, he could see none of the inner circle there – the Ginyu Force was conspicuously absent, as were Zarbon and Kuii. 

He cursed himself for letting them sneak up upon him. What had he been thinking? The answer was of course, that he hadn't been thinking, distracted as he was by the onna's ministrations. _Damn her_. It was all her fault, and now they were caught. As closely as Vegeta could determine, he was the strongest fighter there, with the possible exception of the strange young man. However, against thirty the odds were not good. Even though Vegeta was superior to them all in strength and fighting experience, the troops here were still more than competent, and weighed down as he would be by the burden of protecting Bulma, inevitably Vegeta would be defeated.

When Vegeta turned his attention back to the leader, he was unsurprised to find that he was studying him in turn. What did startle him was the level of hatred visible in his green eyes. Vegeta had no personal recollection of the blond human, and he wondered fleetingly why a stranger would hold such obvious animosity towards him. He dismissed the thought quickly though. It was entirely possible he had purged this young mans planet, or had somehow unwittingly caused him indirect harm, even if he had not done anything to him personally. All that was important right now was that he was captive again, and for the first time, he couldn't see a way out of the situation.

The young man ceased his inspection of Vegeta, and came to a stop in front of him. 

"So, we have found you at last," he said softly. "Vegeta no Ouji."

Vegeta said nothing, choosing to merely glare at the young man. Though Vegeta was sure he had never seen him before, something was familiar about his green eyes, like an itch in the back of his head.

Suddenly, the leader lashed out with his foot, catching Vegeta a surprise blow in the stomach. Vegeta's eyes widened at the unexpected pain, and he began to dart forward to retaliate, but something was holding him in place. Invisible bonds wrapped tight around his arms and legs, immobilizing him. He could not move anything but his eyes, which blazed angrily at the young leader who was now standing before him, a tight smile on his face. 

"Having some trouble there, little monkey?" he inquired. "Finding it hard to move?" His fist lashed out again, this time catching Vegeta on the nose. Vegeta could feel the fragile cartilage shatter, pain lancing up into his brain like a knife. He grunted and fell to his knees, determined not to make a sound. Warm blood spurted down his face, soaking the top of his already stained uniform. The dying rays of the now setting sun stabbed into his eyes, making it hard to see.

The young man stood over Vegeta for a moment, enjoying the sight of the arrogant young saiyan in pain. Vegeta could hear Bulma whimpering behind him, and spared a glance in her direction. She was standing stiffly, tears of shock and fear running down her face. She made no move however, and from this Vegeta gathered that she too was immobilized by the same strange power, or else was too frightened to move. Either way it didn't matter. With Vegeta incapacitated, neither of them had a chance of getting away. 

The green-eyed young man was still staring down at him. "Who are you?" Vegeta managed through the blood was beginning to clog up his respiratory system, making it hard to breathe. 

The young man did not answer him. Instead, he turned to his men. "Bind the woman and take her away." Four soldiers detached themselves from their positions and roughly bound the terrified onna with rope. She kicked at them viciously, catching one man a decent blow in the groin, before the young man waved his hand at her and she stiffened instantly, paralysed. Vegeta watched helplessly, still unable to move due to the same trick the man had pulled on him. The soldiers finished their job quickly, though they didn't refrain from cuffing her about. Finally, the four soldiers picked up her inert body, carrying her off out of Vegeta's sight. 

"Who are you!" snarled Vegeta. The pain from his shattered nose was excruciating, causing his head to throb, making it hard to think. Close behind that was the image of Bulma being used by the four soldiers. Guilt stabbed unmercifully at him, guilt for not protecting her, for failing again. 

The young man looked at him, hatred in his eyes. "I am the one who's going to send you to hell."

Vegeta choked out a laugh that ended in a cough. He spat the blood out of his mouth, and looked up at the young man contemptuously. "Too late," he said. "I'm already there."

~*~*~*~*~

Jalen followed the bound Vegeta thoughtfully. This personal intervention was not exactly according to the rules, but then again, who had expected that the saiyan would be so difficult to control. Vegeta stumbled along ahead of him, his mouth spewing forth a steady stream of curses and imprecations against the soldiers holding him captive. Jalen's trick had been modified to bind only his arms and torso, but a close eye needed to be kept on him in case the enraged prince decided to attack with his legs. However, as Jalen had predicted, once the woman was out of sight, she was out of his mind as well. Vegeta showed nothing of his previous determination to escape, and his resistance seemed merely a protest against his mode of transportation. He had been informed that Frieza had summoned, and Vegeta probably was once again aware of the consequences of disobeying a direct command from their leader. No doubt it was not necessary to bind him in this way, but Jalen felt he owed it to Alaria to make the murdering bastard as uncomfortable as possible. 

They drew near the compound where Frieza was holding his temporary headquarters, and Jalen carefully slipped back to the rear of the group. It wasn't necessary that he be present for this part of the proceedings – in fact, Jalen was well aware that the less he interfered in this memory the better. The Federation would not accept a recording that had been obviously tampered with. And without the Federation's approval he could not remove the inhibitions in his mind that prevented him from doing anything permanent to Vegeta. The peace-loving Federation had taken it upon themselves to cripple anyone with dangerous inclinations by placing blockages in their minds that prevented the use of violence with murderous intent. So until Jalen could provide proof of the murder of Alaria, who was important enough that the Federation would bend their rule of non-violence in order to avenge her, Jalen was forced to control his rage. 

He felt his gorge rising and a red mist begin to cover his eyes at the very thought of his Alaria dying at the hands of the monster walking arrogantly ahead of him, and was forced to blink rapidly, breathing deeply to calm himself. _Not too much longer now,_ he promised himself. 

The troop of soldiers had now pulled ahead of him, and were some distance away. Jalen decided it was time to exit this scenario. He would be able to watch much better from in front of the monitor, with less danger of affecting the outcome of the dream. He concentrated, and the scene around him faded, to be replaced with the inquiring gaze of Remmy. Jalen smiled a tight smile of reassurance at him, and glanced at the screen. Vegeta was entering Frieza's headquarters, seemingly oblivious of his captors disappearance. The woman was nowhere to be seen. He focused his mind, and felt her presence once more within the house. His plan was working perfectly, and he had only really broken the rules a little bit by taking the girl away. She was not even meant to be there in the first place after all, so it was only right that Jalen remove her from the recording, even if it had meant he had to interfere personally.

And what the Federation did not know could not possibly be used against him. All that mattered in the end, after all, was that they find a record of Alaria's death. With luck, the recording device embedded in Remmy's collar would tape this memory. With a genuine record of her murder, Jalen could use his powers without fear of retribution from the Federation against the unwitting saiyan. His death would be inevitable from that point, and Alaria would finally have her vengeance.

~*~*~*~*~

Vegeta stood in front of Frieza, his skin crawling at his proximity. Nothing showed on his face though, trained by years of servitude to remain blank. Only his eyes burned. 

Frieza lounged on his throne, his tail flicking idly in the air, amused at the young saiyan's anger. Vegeta still bled at the mouth from where Jalen had hit him earlier, though he had been allowed to set his nose back in place. The stabbing pain had dulled, replaced by a smouldering headache and a strange light-headedness due to loss of blood. Frieza was watching him, knowing full well the discomfort that Vegeta was in, and delighting in the fact that Vegeta's pride would not let him show the weakness in front of him. Frieza observed him for a few minutes longer trying to see if he would crack. However, when Vegeta stubbornly showed no sign of relenting he tired of the game, and spoke curtly. "There is a young girl somewhere in this area. She has evaded capture, and needs to be taught a lesson."

Vegeta scowled at the order. "Then why don't you send one of you pet lackeys out after her? You are going to waste one of your best fighters on some little girl?"

Frieza raised an eyebrow. 

"Are you questioning my decision?" The tone was deceptively mild, but Vegeta knew the pink snake well enough to understand a threat when he heard it. He did not answer even though he was seething inside. Frieza inspected him for a few moments longer, drawing out the moment, before continuing. 

"Two separate squads have been sent after this girl already. Neither have reported back to me. That makes twenty of our best troops annihilated by this 'little girl'." Frieza's eyes narrowed. "I want you to find this girl and kill her, do you understand? She is a danger to our operations here. This will be your last chance to redeem yourself. Fail, and I will have to think of something worse than a little roughhousing to punish you with." Frieza's voice trailed off with a thin smile and his tail darted forward to stroke the inside of Vegeta's thigh suggestively. 

Vegeta flinched away from the lecherous tail involuntarily, then froze when he heard Frieza's mocking laugh. Vegeta did not respond, barely able to control his disgust and fear. Frieza smiled and looked at him intently when he did not answer, and seemed satisfied with what he saw in the saiyan's blazing eyes. He waved a languid hand in dismissal, and Vegeta turned around, walking out of the room with his head high and face impassive. 

~*~*~*~*~

Vegeta paused behind a cover of bushes in front of a small clearing, a small ki ball in his hand, ready to use. He had prowled though the wilderness searching for the mysterious girl for a little more than an hour now. The scouter he had taken from the store-bay did not seem to work effectively. His own scouter seemed to have been lost or broken at some point - his memories were not exactly clear. Every time he tried to pin down exactly what had happened to it, his mind slipped away like an wet fish. This lack of recollection bothered him, but there was no time to examine the reasons why now. 

The young girl stood in the clearing ahead of him. Her body was tiny but fully formed. Vegeta noted with a flicker of surprise that she was not as young as he had assumed at first. The girl standing in front of him was in her late teens, and her features were delicate with a luminous beauty. Long silver-blonde hair whipped around her in the wind. But it was her eyes that struck him the most. Her large round eyes were silver - not silver as the eyes of normal people were coloured, but pure silver from edge to edge, as if she wore sunglasses under her skin. They stared at him like mirrors, betraying no expression. Vegeta could see his reflection clearly in those large silver orbs, a bloody, tattered version of his former self. 

For a moment, he wavered. The girl just stood there. The ki ball in his hand was growing uncomfortable. Why didn't she run? If she ran than Vegeta could just shoot her down. But this silent waiting for death was unnerving. Vegeta hesitated, then gave a mental shrug. Dead was dead, after all. Did it really matter how he did it? With that thought, he released the ki ball, and watched to dart through the air towards the girl, passing cleanly through her heart. She fell to her knees without a sound, blood soaking through the soft material of her clothing. She coughed once and blood trickled out of her open mouth. She looked up at him one last time, her eyes still eerily blank. She regarded him for a moment, a look of almost pity crossing her face. 

Then she was dead.

* * *

Next time on Aishiteru, Bulma tries to persuade herself that it was all a dream, while Jalen carries out Phase Two of his plan. Unfortunately for him, Kalika decides to take some steps of her own. Find out what happens, in the next chapter of Aishiteru ^_^

Thanks so much to all of my wonderful reviewers. Six chapters in, and not a single derogatory comment! ^_^ I think that's a good record. 

*sigh* I promised myself that I would finish this on tues night so as to be all ready for Wednesday, and now look at me. Almost tea time wed night, and I'm only just finishing an inexcusably short chapter. I swear its not my fault though. My friend had the bad taste to distract me by d/l the first Inuyasha episode for me, and I got so caught up in writing this idea I got for an Inuyasha-ian one-shot that I completely forgot I was supposed to update today. *throws cd at karen* Blame her, not me! Anyways, at least its here, right? 

To **outtadaloop** **- ** Here you go, some bona fide Jalen and Alaria for you. I wonder if you can see where I am going with this yet…

To **DBZjezzy15 - **I know! Just as things were starting to go somewhere… I hope this is soon enough for you, I try to update at least once a week, maybe twice depending on how inspired I feel…or how many reviews I get (hint hint) ^_~

To **Tempest12 **- Thanks so much for reviewing ^_^ Yeah, I love it when Vegeta lets people help him…*trails off* Um, that is I would love it if he ever actually did. *tries hard to think of an episode where Vegeta allows someone to help him* Ah well, it could have happened!

To **DBZ-fan-JESS** - *blushes* aw, gee shucks ma'am. I am only here to please ^_^

To **angel star - ** Aishiteru is a Japanese phrase meaning 'I love you' It's actually s'posed to be spelt ai shiteru, but it makes a better title if you run it together, and hey! Its not like any of us actually speak Japanese well enough to object, no?

To **Lilac Cherry Blossoms **- Thanks for reviewing again - I love it when people come back to read my stories. Shows I'm not doing badly enough to scare you away. ^_^ Hope you like this chapter as much as the last.

To **Dr Spleenmeister **- Hmm, well its hard to say if the idea is original or not. _I'd _like to say it is, but I think I have read several stories before where people mess with their heads in order to manipulate them - some things like The Wee People, by Terry Pratchett (an actual author), or Run From it, by Bulmaveg_Otaku. I swear the idea of Jalen, Alaria and Kalika are all mine though ^_^ I'm so flattered that you would put me on your favourites list and I'm not even finished! What if the ending sucks? *bites lip, worried* Ah well, I'll just have to make sure it doesn't, right? ^_^

And, of course to ** DBZ Fanfiction Queen** Thanks for your support ^_^ You're the best 

Watch out for the next chapter on Monday (25th August). Please Review! Oh, and by the way, does anyone know where I could get decent episodes of inuyasha? The aforementioned one that my friend d/l for me had the stupidest subtitles - translated directly without even an attempt to keep with the spirit of the script. Please, save me from the horror! The horror….


	7. motives

Chapter seven – motives

__

"Oh you can't help that," said the Cat: "We're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad."

"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.

"You must be," said the Cat, "or you wouldn't have come here."

~ Lewis Carroll

Bulma rubbed her eyes for the fifth time that morning in hopes that this time, finally, the scene before her would be different. She opened her eyes hopefully, but nothing had changed. Bulma sighed, and began to think that perhaps she wasn't in the middle of some strange dream after all. 

Bulma had awoken that morning feeling sore and tired. She lay in bed for a few minutes without opening her eyes. Snatches of a strange dream floated before her eyes. Yelling at Yamcha outside Capsule Corp. A strange red place, the air filled with screams of torment that even now made her blood curl. A soldier crouched on top of her, his ugly face leering into her own as his hand tore lustfully at her thighs. Vegeta, his dark eyes gazing into her own with unidentifiable emotions swimming in their depths as she gently cleaned his bloody cheek with a rag. 

Bulma shook her head slightly, trying to forget the edges of the disturbing dream. _Must have been too much pizza before bed_, she thought wearily. 

Finally, the sunlight beating down unmercifully on her face forced her to move, if only to shut the curtains. The moment she began to move, she regretted it. Her body was stiff and sore, as if she had run a six minute mile in her sleep. Groaning to herself, she stumbled out of bed over to the curtains. She pulled the thick felt shut gratefully, as blessed darkness overwhelmed her room. She was just crawling back into bed, every muscle protesting from the exertion, when she caught sight of something black out of the corner of her eye. She turned her head to look properly, and nearly fell off the bed. 

Vegeta was standing in the middle of her room, dressed in a pair of long dark pants, his chest bare. 

"What the HELL are you DOING in my ROOM!" Bulma screamed. 

He didn't reply. Bulma looked closer, and saw that he wasn't even looking at her, but at some intermediate point above her head. Red lights began to flash before her eyes. 

"Talk to me, you…you hentai!" How DARE you come into my room without my express permission, _especially_ when I am asleep! Vegeta! VEGETA, LOOK AT ME!"

Vegeta still stood motionless in the middle of her room, his face expressionless as ever. Forgetting about her pain in her rage, she sprang out of bed and stood right in front of him so he couldn't possibly ignore her. 

"Vegeta!" she yelled again. He didn't even twitch. Now that Bulma was standing so close, she noticed that his eyes, usually so full of fire, were as blank as the rest of his face. His trademark scowl was also absent. Bulma waved her hand in front of his face. 

"Hello? Vegeta!"

No response, not so much as a flicker of an eyelid. 

__

Fine, she thought. _Two can play that game…_ Casting around, Bulma found a pair of scissors on her desk. Moving away quickly, she picked up the scissors, hiding them with her body. She crept forward carefully, the sharp point cold in her hand, then suddenly jabbed the point into Vegeta's arm. 

He didn't move. Bulma drew back in confusion, and saw with a tiny twinge of dismay a small line of blood sliding down his shoulder from where the scissors had pierced his skin. She hovered uncertainly. That trick had always worked in the movies. But Vegeta was a warrior, she reminded herself. He would have a way of being able to deal with pain, surely. He must have seen the scissors after all, and tensed himself to show no reaction.

All thoughts of anger had fled, and now Bulma was concerned only with beating the saiyan in this bizarre little game of self control. She considered maybe telling him a joke to make him laugh, then almost fell over herself as she tried to picture Vegeta rolling on the floor laughing because of some stupid joke. She thought hard for a moment, then remembered how he had flinched away from her touch yesterday. Maybe…

She stopped thinking and acted; standing on tiptoes, she opened her mouth and _licked_ the side of his face from chin to crown in one long soggy swipe. 

She stood back, then the reality of what she had just done hit her. `Oh my God," she cringed. "I cant believe I just _licked_ Vegeta. He's going to kill me for that!" 

However, as she straightened warily, she noticed that Vegeta still hadn't moved. That, more than anything convinced her that something was wrong. If he had been conscious while she licked him, she would probably be a very small pile of ash at the moment. For that, at least, Bulma was glad that he was either a very committed actor, or he truly was unaware of what was happening. 

So what was wrong with him. Bulma walked around him again, more thoughtfully this time. Maybe he was sleepwalking? But he wasn't moving at all – he was sleep-standing if anything. And what was he doing in her room in the first place? Vegeta normally religiously avoided every part of the house besides the kitchen, the gravity room and his own bedroom, as if he did not want to trespass on their hospitality any more than necessary. The visit to her lab yesterday had been an anomaly. 

Wait a minute. Could the two be connected? Bulma played with the idea for a while. _Lets see…Vegeta makes unexpected visit to my lab in the middle of the day. He makes no explanation of why he was there, just looked around weirdly, then looked embarrassed and left. Now he is in my room at eight o'clock in the morning, apparently upright and breathing, but no lights on inside. _

She floated the two events in her mind, trying to connect the pieces like an unruly jigsaw puzzle, but finally she shook her head. It just didn't make sense. His body was breathing, but it seemed to be just an empty shell – the soul inside was gone. She shivered involuntarily, and suddenly realised that she had been standing around in the middle of the room wearing nothing but the short chemise she slept in. Wrapping her arms around herself for warmth, she went over to grab her dressing gown, then hesitated. Unconscious or not, she would feel better about being in the same room with Vegeta if she was properly dressed. Vague memories of last nights dream crossed her mind, and she grabbed a towel hastily, flushing even though there was no one there to see. A shower and about three cups of coffee were definitely in order. Then, perhaps, she would be capable of trying to figure out this mystery.

~*~*~*~*~ 

A half hour shower and a hasty breakfast later, Bulma walked slowly back up to her room, holding her fourth cup of coffee in her hand. As she climbed the steps to her room, someone behind her called out her name. 

"Ms Briefs!" Kalika, the dark-haired girl she had introduced to Yamcha yesterday was two steps behind her. 

Bulma paused on the stairs, looking back in concern. "What is it? Is something wrong?" she asked immediately. 

"No, no nothing like that," said Kalika quickly. "I was just wondering if you would be able to help me with something." 

Bulma looked at her in confusion, then smiled as she thought she saw a look that she recognised. "What sort of thing?"

"Well, I was wondering…if you're not too busy this morning…" the dark eyed girl blushed and fidgeted slightly under Bulma's amused gaze. At last, taking pity on the poor girl, Bulma decided to help her out.

"You have guy trouble, right?" she asked, and was rewarded by a deepened blush from the reputably unflappable woman. Bulma smiled at Kalika. _Perhaps a little matchmaking will take my mind off Vegeta_. "Who is it?"

Kalika opened her mouth, but Bulma waved her silent. "No, wait, let me guess. Is it…Taiji, from engineering?" Kalika shook her head, her eyes dancing with suppressed laughter. "Hmm, how about that cute geneticist that did the contract work here last week? Or is it that masseuse that was here the other day? He was kinda hot." Again, Kalika gestured a negative, and Bulma thought hard, enjoying the game. A thought struck her. "It isn't Yamcha, is it?" 

Kalika looked wistful for a second. "No, its not him either," she sighed. "It could have been, if I had met him a few days earlier. He took me to lunch yesterday, and he was really sweet, but now that I've met this other guy, I'm sorry to say he doesn't have a chance."

Bulma smiled at Kalika. "So its that good, is it?"

Kalika smiled back. "I really think so. I cant stop thinking about him, to tell the truth, even though he doesn't show any interest in me at all that way. "

"Give me a hint," said Bulma, still searching her mind for any guys at Capsule Corp that would make a beautiful girl like Kalika head over heels in love. 

"Well, he's here most of the time, although he doesn't come from here originally. He's really smart, but it doesn't seem like it is important to him that he is. From what I can tell, he is really intense about everything. He's kinda strange, and sometimes he'll say something, or do something that just reminds me of how foreign he really is. Oh, and he's good looking, though not in a conventional sort of way., with a _great_ body. Can you guess yet?"

Bulma wrinkled her nose in thought, when an idea hit her that felt like someone had punched her in the stomach. _I wonder…It couldn't be…Vegeta could it?_ Bulma tried to dismiss the idea immediately, but the edges of it kept nagging at her mind. _ She did say he was foreign, and Vegeta is about as foreign as you can get. Plus I cant think of anyone who is more intense than Vegeta about everything – for Vegeta everything is either beneath his notice, or becomes an obsession. As for a great body, well_. Bulma choked off that thought, the image of the motionless saiyan still standing in her room half naked causing her to blush for no apparent reason. Kalika was looking at her curiously, so hesitatingly, Bulma asked her if the guy worked for Capsule Corp. 

"Yes, in one of the production departments, I think."

Bulma relaxed immediately, laughing at herself for getting so tense about it. So what if Kalika was in love with Vegeta anyway. It's not like it mattered to her, and having a lover would probably be good for Vegeta – at the very least it might make him a bit more relaxed. In spite of that, the thought of Vegeta having a lover was strangely upsetting. Bulma pushed that thought away. It wasn't Vegeta anyway, so why was she worrying over it still? As she tried to clear her mind, the answer came to her, and she laughed. 

"Of course," she said out loud. "Its that new guy, the one I knocked over the other day. What was his name?" Bulma snapped her fingers. "Jalen, that's it." She looked over at Kalika. "I'm right, aren't I?"

The dark haired woman nodded. "But he doesn't pay any attention to me at all. I think he might already have a girlfriend back home or something. I've tried everything I could think of, from just being friendly to low cut blouses to being practically blunt about it. Nothing seems to work."

Bulma smiled at the young woman. "Of course I'll help you. We just need to find his weak spot, that's all."

"But what if he already has a girlfriend?" 

"I promise you, after we're through, he will be flat out remembering her name."

Kalika smiled up at the blue-haired heiress gratefully. "Thanks a lot, Ms Briefs."

"Please, call me Bulma. Everyone else does, and we can hardly be partners in crime if we don't make proper friends, now can we?"

"Bulma, then," said Kalika. 

The two women smiled at each other, both feeling the pull of friendship begun anew. Finally, Bulma broke the moment with a grin. 

"So lets say we do some reconnaissance and get you your guy." She stood. Ready?"

"Ready!"

~*~*~*~*~ 

Jalen sat in front of the monitor, absently stroking Remmy's head as he concentrated on the screen. He could see Vegeta in the midst of some of the scrub that covered the Western portion of Athus. Jalen watched as the saiyan threaded his way through the trees, slightly envious of the grace and speed Vegeta employed. His heart skipped a beat though, when Vegeta paused at the edge of a clearing. 

It was her.

Jalen could see her standing there, looking innocent and sadly knowing all at the same time. He drank in the lines of her figure, the perfection of her face. Most of all, he gazed at her eyes, sliver and glowing, but still full of a melancholy resignation. A cold chill clutched at his heart. What if Alaria knew of her impending death? He had often wondered that before. Her psychic powers in that respect far outdistanced his own. It seemed impossible that she could not have known of her own murder at the hands of the saiyan prince. Yet if she knew about the attack as Jalen suspected she did, why didn't she avoid the encounter like she had all the rest? From the records, Jalen already knew that at this point she had already evaded two squads of Frieza's top warriors, sending them into oblivion, but then why did she choose to face Vegeta? Why was she just standing there?

As a matter of fact, why was _Vegeta_ just standing there? The two of them were poised in a motionless tableau for so long that Jalen began to wonder if the monitor had somehow frozen. He thumped the screen and when they still didn't move, cursed and began fiddling around with the cords at the back. _Not now,_ he pleaded. Not at the most important point in the whole enterprise. It was vital that he capture this moment on tape. 

Frantically trying to adjust the cords at the back of the monitor, Jalen didn't notice the two women standing behind him until it was too late. Finally, something alerted him to the presence of people, and he stood in a panic, catching his head hard on the shelf above his desk. He ignored the pain and desperately reached over to try and turn the monitor off. Someone stood in front of him, blocking his way. Jalen looked up with a sinking heart to see Bulma's blue head bending over the monitor. He straightened, plastering a false smile on his face. 

"This is a nice recording you have here," said Bulma. "The image is extraordinarily clear. Its as if its happening right here in this room. Did you take this yourself?"

Jalen darted a swift glance at the monitor and was relieved to see that Vegeta was for the moment out of sight. It would have been difficult in the extreme to explain to Bulma why he had footage of her alien houseguest on another world. Bulma was looking at the wide red clearing by the stream where Alaria stood. Jalen opened his mouth to say something polite, trying to fob her off before she noticed Vegeta, when he caught sight of Kalika, kneeling beside Remmy. _Damn. Two of them._

"She's a beautiful girl," said Bulma lightly when he failed to answer, examining the image of Alaria with marked interest. "Such unusual colouring. Is she your girlfriend?"

Jalen's mind raced as he tried to think of a way to get the two women out of the room. "She was," he said carelessly. Bulma exchanged a glance with Kalika. "What happened?" she asked casually. 

"She's dead now," said Jalen shortly. 

Bulma's face was abruptly serious. "I'm sorry for you."

Jalen's eyes narrowed. "Its not _your _fault." 

Bulma frowned in reply, confused by his peculiar emphasis. Kalika took the chance to say from behind them, "Is this your dog, Jalen?" 

Jalen swung around, glad to divert attention away from the screen. "Yes, this is Remmy," he said. Remmy used his tongue to lick Kalika up the side of her face. She flinched back, laughing. 

"That means he likes you," said Jalen smiling faintly. _That's strange. Normally Remmy wont even go near strangers._

"Well, I like him too," said Kalika, rubbing his ears affectionately. Remmy made a deep sound of contentment, and rubbed his head along Kalika's hand. Jalen frowned at Remmy in astonishment. "He's a strange breed. What exactly is he?"

Jalen looked vague. "One of those foreign types," he said lightly. The lunch bell rang, saving him. He moved away, clearly intending to show his two uninvited guests the door. Bulma exchanged a glance with Kalika, and the two women walked towards the door. 

"Are you going to come and have lunch with me?" asked Kalika innocently as she stepped out the door. Jalen looked non-committal. "I'm afraid I have some urgent work-"

Bulma cut him off before he could reply. "Nonsense," she said lightly. "Its Saturday. Go and have a break." Jalen wanted to refuse, but was daunted by the dual facts of both Bulma and Kalika's superior authority, and the fact that Bulma was standing directly in front of the door, blocking his way. Bulma noticed his look, and said. "Don't worry about your stuff. I'm sure Remmy will guard it until you get back."

With that, Jalen had to leave. He closed his eyes as he walked away with Kalika, and prayed that Remmy would manage to continue taping on his own. He should be more than able to, but Jalen had wanted to see the murder first hand. _Never mind, _he thought to himself. _It will be all there when I get back. And with that kind of proof, the Federation will have no scruples in letting me dispose of Vegeta. _He looked up to the family quarters of Capsule Corp where he knew Vegeta must be, helpless to defend himself. _Soon, Alaria,_ he promised. _Very soon…_

Behind him, once Kalika and Jalen were out of sight, Bulma turned back to the door of Jalen's office. Producing a key card, she opened the door, looked around stealthily, then slipped inside. The door shut softly behind her. 

* * *

Next time on Aishiteru, Bulma makes an unsettling discovery, and Vegeta makes a new friend when he finds that that things are not all that they appear to be. Watch out for them both, next chapter in Aishiteru. 

Muchos gracias para loyal reviewers snowbell101, Lilac Cherry Blossoms, Bebi_Mara_Jade and Tempest12. THanks so much for your support ^_^ 


	8. note

Hey guys ^_^   
Something happened to my email account and i didnt get these reviews until today. So i just thought i would make a quick mention of them here now:

Special thanks to Dragonball Fanfiction Queen and a mysterious person called "s" for reviewing chapter six of Aishiteru. Sorry i missed out on giving you a mention at the end of chapter seven, but here you go with your own personal mention here. The next chapter will be up sometime between friday and saturday. 

See you then ^_^


	9. revelations

Chapter eight – revelations

__

"What I have shown you is reality....what you choose to remember is the illusion" 

~ Sephiroth

Vegeta waited in the shadows of the brush for a breathless moment after he had watched the strange girl die. Despite the proof that lay in front of his eyes, his battle sharpened senses told him that something was wrong. Cautiously he stepped out from the edges of the forest and approached the small figure lying pathetically on the in the middle of the clearing. Her white smock was stained with blood, and her silver eyes were lifeless. No doubt about it. The girl was dead. Vegeta had seen death to many times in his past to be possibly mistaken about it. Still something about this whole scene was unsettling. 

It certainly wasn't that he felt ashamed of what he had done. Frieza had told him that the girl was certainly not defenceless, and regardless of her ability to defend herself, death was infinitely better than her fate if she was caught by Frieza. She should be grateful that he had spared her that. No, it wasn't that he felt sorry about what he had just done. It was something else

Something about this scene definitely wasn't right. 

Reaching the corpse, he leaned forward, using the toe of his boot to nudge the still figure on the ground. But the moment his foot touched the body, the figure seemed to break up like a video screen going out of focus, then it disappeared entirely, leaving Vegeta staring blankly at the empty space. 

His senses flared, and he swung round, cursing himself for his stupidity. It was too easy! Of course he should have known something was not right. Someone who had disposed of two whole squads of Frieza's crack troops wasn't likely to just stand there and let him kill him. It had to have been some sort of elaborate trick.

Vegeta was poised for an attack, and his nerves were only strung tighter when none came. For long moments he stood in the middle of the clearing, horribly aware that he was in an extremely bad tactical position. The forest surrounded him on all sides, yet he was unprotected and an easy target in the centre of the clearing. The seconds lengthened into minutes as he stood there, every sense alert for the attack which he was sure would come. 

"I know who you are, Vegeta no Ouji."

The voice came from all around him, echoing from the trees. Vegeta swung round almost desperately, trying to locate the source of the voice. 

"Show yourself, you coward!" he shouted to the silent forest. Nothing moved, yet Vegeta could feel the sense of someone all around him. He tensed, scanning the dark edges of the forest desperately for the source. 

"I know why you've come."

The voice was light and silvery, like bells chiming in the distance. Vegeta could not tell where it originated, and he turned around and around in the clearing, while the echoes swirled about him. 

"I know you were ordered to kill me."

Vegeta swung round one last time, and saw on the edge of the clearing behind him the young girl he had thought dead by his hand just minutes before. Her silver hair floated gently around her although there was no breeze. Her eerie eyes, silver from edge to edge stared at him without expression, although her tiny face seemed sad. Her white smock was spotless, with no trace of the bloodstains that had covered it earlier. 

Vegeta swore and leapt to attack. He moved towards her faster than the eye could follow, but despite his speed his foot connected only with air. She was gone again, this time without even so much as a warning. 

"I know that you will be punished if you do not succeed."

She was behind him again, her hair floating in that mysterious breeze that seemed to be as much part of her as were her mirror-like eyes.

Vegeta held his ground, wary now. She seemed to recognise that he was ready to talk. Her head was cocked ever so slightly to one side as she observed him. "I have already disposed of the men who were sent to kill me by your master."

"He is _not_ my master," Vegeta snarled.

She stared at him without replying for a long time. Finally she said. "He rules over you, though you would wish it not. I can see his mark upon you. Even after he is dead, he will live on in you, if you are not wary now."

Vegeta felt anger boil up in him at the thought of Frieza being connected to him in any way. "What would you know about it!" 

"I can see it," she said calmly. 

"You're lying," he snapped back at her.

She regarded him for a moment. "You know that I am not. The reason why Frieza wants me destroyed is because of my gift."

"What gift?" said Vegeta, his eyes narrowed.

The girls face grew sad, and strangely wistful. "I see things," she said. "About people, about what may happen in the future. Many things."

"Why would Frieza want to destroy such a gift?" Vegeta narrowed his eyes again. "I should take you back and force you to tell what you know."

She seemed to grow stern, although neither her expression nor her voice changed. "My gift cannot be forced. If you try, I shall simply depart, as I did when you attempted to attack me before." 

Vegeta sneered at her. "If you can just disappear at will, why are you still here talking to me? Why don't you run away now?" 

"You will not hurt me again," she said calmly. 

Vegeta snorted and opened his mouth to deny her claim, but the girl held up a hand to cut off his words.

"I, who knows the future, know that you will not, for I must speak with you."

The girl drifted closer, her feet seeming to skim just above the ground rather than walk normally. "I told you that I had disposed of the twenty men sent after me already." She looked up at him intently. "I did it so that I could contact you."

Vegeta sneered. "What pressing need would a little mind-leech like you have with the Saiyan no Ouiji?" Vegeta smirked briefly as he saw her face flicker at the word. "Yes, I know what you are now," he said. "You are one of those telepaths from that weak little Federation. What are you really doing here, mind-leech?"

"I am from the Federation," she said, unfazed. "And I am here to meet you."

"Oh, please," said Vegeta, turning away. "Don't give me that again." 

"It is true. I need help only you can give me."

"What kind of help?" asked Vegeta, still sceptical. 

"You will understand when the time comes. All I ask now is for you to remember me, and what I am about to tell you."

Vegeta narrowed his eyes at her. "Give me one good reason why I shouldn't just blast you to kingdom come?"

That serene smile again. "Because you cannot. You have tried that already, remember? "

Vegeta scowled at the slim young girl. She waited, her face maddeningly tranquil. Finally, he capitulated. "Alright. I'm listening," he said. You have five minutes before I attack you again. Convince me."

__

~*~*~*~*~

Jalen sat opposite Kalika, not really paying attention to her chatter, his mind centred on thoughts of Remmy, and the vital scene his strange pet was hopefully recording. Only when he became aware of a long silence from the other side of the table did he blink and look at her, belatedly realizing that she was waiting for him to reply to some comment she had made. He stared at her helplessly, with not the least idea of what she had been talking about. 

Kalika smiled back at him, obviously aware he hadn't been listening. 

Jalen felt the edges of a scowl begin on his face. He should just get up and leave now, be damned her superior status. It wasn't as if he would need to maintain his cover here anyway after tonight. The footage Remmy was recording would be enough proof for the Federation to loosen the grip they had on his violent impulses once he sent it to them, and then he could complete his mission and get the hell off this stupid planet. 

But then again, there was something about Kalika.

Something familiar and strangely comforting, as if he had met her long ago, and they had both forgotten. Which was stupid, of course. Jalen knew for a certainty that he had never been on this planet before, and there was no way he could have met her anywhere else. 

Still, there was something about her. Jalen wasn't blind. He was fairly sure Kalika liked him. But the thought of someone liking him in that way was unsettling even now, although his beloved Alaria was long dead. 

Jalen shook his head. No, the thought of loving someone else was unthinkable. Even sitting here with Kalika he felt uncomfortable, as if he was betraying Alaria's memory. He couldn't do this, no matter how pleasant it was to sit here and pretend he had a normal life. 

Having made up his mind, Jalen abruptly pushed himself back from the table. 

Kalika looked up at him in alarm. 

"You're not leaving yet are you?" she said. "You haven't even finished your lunch."

Jalen looked away from her. "I'm sorry, but I really should get back to work."

Kalika said nothing. The silence lengthened, until it became almost a living thing between them. Eventually, Jalen couldn't take it, and turned back to her to make sure she was okay. 

The look in her eyes hit him like a punch in the stomach. She smiled politely at him, but Jalen could see that she had understood his rejection all too clearly. She stood along with him, and gestured with her hand to the door. 

"You go along then," she said. "I'll pay for the bill."

Jalen hesitated. This was what he wanted. Kalika would only be a confusion in his life, a disloyalty to his first and greatest love. He should be grateful that she was taking the rejection so gently. But the look in her eyes twisted up his insides.

It didn't make sense. They had only met a handful of times. How could he mean so much to her that she looked on the verge of tears at his rejection? From office gossip he knew Kalika was the kind of woman who had a long string of lovers. Surely she couldn't be so attached to him in less than a week that all of that didn't matter anymore.

And what was the meaning of the strange reluctance he felt to leave the woman? She was still standing opposite him, a smile on her face, and jagged emotion in her eyes. Slowly, Jalen sat down again. She looked surprised, and a flash of joy darted over her face before she could rearrange it in a more suitable expression. 

"I'll stay and finish lunch," said Jalen. The smile on Kalika's face made his heart thump painfully in his chest, and he had to restrain himself from grinning back at her like a fool.

It couldn't hurt to stay a little longer…

__

~*~*~*~*~

Vegeta blinked.

The green of the forest faded away, and he realised he was back in Bulma's pink and white room. He stood still for a moment, feeling the memories rush back. He had been inside the strange dream-trap again. But strangely, this time when he was separated from the onna, he had forgotten that it was a dream at all. He remembered the fight with the guards, Bulma bandaging his wound, and his meeting with Frieza, unable to hold back a slight shudder at the last. 

There was something else as well…

A strange young girl, whom he had killed, only to have her live again. And then she had told him….

Told him things that he was still mulling over in his head. 

He carefully tucked the knowledge away inside his mind to deal with later. He knew now who was setting the traps, and thanks to the strange girl, knew exactly what do about them. However, nothing could be done until nightfall. 

He glanced over at the unmade bed in front of him, and suddenly realised that Bulma must have found him here, standing still and zombie like. He scowled. That surely couldn't be good. However, he would inform her of what was happening when he saw her again, and then there would be no trouble about it. She was a genius after all, surely she would be able to understand. Vegeta shook his head slightly to rid himself of the image of Bulma as she washed his face. Still it returned with a maddening intensity, her blue eyes serious as she concentrated on her ministrations, her hands soft and gentle. 

Not that she had known what she was doing at the time. It was all a dream anyway. She probably didn't even remember. 

Not that it mattered to him whether she remembered or not. Vegeta turned and strode out of her room, angry for some obscure reason. It didn't matter. What mattered was catching that damn dream-weaver and beating the crap out of him for daring to invade the privacy of his own head. But he couldn't do anything about it now. 

In the meantime, he needed to train. 

__

~*~*~*~*~

It was a few hours later when Vegeta finally caught sight of Bulma. He had been training in the gravity room since he had been woken from the strange dream, and had just come in for a drink. Bulma ignored him as he walked into the kitchen and continued rummaging about in the cupboards above the bench on the far side of the room. Curious, Vegeta craned his neck to try and work out what she was looking for. 

"What are you doing, onna?" he said loudly.

She ignored her. Vegeta frowned – he hated to be ignored. He stood up, and quietly crept over to behind Bulma. He bent low towards her ear, then shouted, "Are you deaf? I asked you a question!"

Bulma jumped slightly, knocking Vegeta painfully on his chin with her head as she did so. Bulma spun round to face him, angry words on her lips, but then smirked as she saw him wincing and rubbing his chin. 

"I am looking for something to eat," she said. "Not that that is any of your business."

Vegeta stopped rubbing his chin and laughed. "There isn't any."

"What?" Bulma said, confused. "Why not?"

"Your idiotic parents are gone for the weekend," said Vegeta. "If you hadn't been too busy with those stupid inventions you would have known that." 

"That doesn't explain why there is no food."

Vegeta shrugged. "I ate the last of it for dinner last night. You haven't gone shopping like you should have, so there's nothing in the house."

Bulma's face fell. "But all the shops are shut now. We're going to starve!"

Vegeta hmphed. He was starving as well, but that was something he would die rather than admit to her. Seeing he had no response, she turned around, and began rifling through the cupboard again. In a moment, however, she sighed, and stood up. "Nothing," she said despondently. "And I'm so hungry." She thrust her hands dejectedly into the pockets of her jacket and began to turn away, then stopped, a huge smile crossing her face. She withdrew her hand from her pocket, pulling out a slightly squished chocolate bar. "I forgot I put this in here after breakfast today."

Vegeta's eyes widened as she ripped the wrapper off the chocolate bar. The smell was practically making him drool. 

"Give me that!" he said.

Bulma glared at him and thrust the bar back into her pocket. "No," she said. "Finders keepers. I found it, so its mine." 

Vegeta lunged at her, but he could not reach the chocolate bar now without touching her, and he _would_ rather starve than do that at the moment. Pretending to loose interest, he turned away and began to examine some objects on the bench top. Picking up a thin gold ring with a diamond embedded into it, he was startled to hear Bulma's intake of breath. 

"That's mine," she said unevenly. "Give it back."

"Give what back? This?" he waved the ring in front of her. "Why should I?"

"Because its mine, Vegeta, that's why." Vegeta heard the strange urgency in her voice, and the beginnings of a plan formed in his mind. 

"Well I found it. Its mine now," he said, turning his back on her and pretending to admire it. 

"Give me back my ring, you thief!" Bulma lunged at Vegeta, grabbing the ring. 

Vegeta darted back out of Bulma's reach and waved a finger reprovingly in her face. "No way. Finders keepers, onna," he taunted. 

Bulma's eyes blazed "That ring is mine and you know it. Give it back this instant!"

"Why should I?"

"Because its _mine_!"

Vegeta smirked. "But I found it. That makes it mine."

"You didn't find it!" she said angrily. "It was sitting on the bench top the whole time."

"So? Just because you knew where it was doesn't mean that I didn't find it."

Abandoning that tactic, Bulma's voice changed, and she looked up at him pleadingly. "Please, Vegeta? That ring was a special present." She sidled closer to him. "Please?"

He pretended to think about it, knowing the delay was driving her crazy. He played with the ring in his hand, noticing how her eyes followed it.

"Well, if I gave you this, then you would have to give me something in return. Fairs fair, right?"

Bulma frowned slightly. "Something like what?"

Vegeta shrugged. "What do you have?"

Bulma scowled. "I don't have anything. You know that."

Vegeta pounced "What about that chocolate bar?"

Bulma looked down at the chocolate in her hand, then back up at him in disgust. "No way. This is mine, and you're not gonna have it."

"Why not," he taunted. "Doesn't your ring mean more to you than a piece of food?"

Vegeta could see her wavering, caught by his words. Unfortunately she also saw the greedy glimpse in his eye as he looked at the chocolate bar.

"No," she said firmly, shoving the bar back into her pocket. "Think of something else."

Vegeta smirked. "Well, you said yourself that you had nothing else to give,"

Bulma made no response, her blue eyes watching him as he played with the ring in front of her. She looked up at him again, a puppy-dog expression on her face. "Please, Vegeta?"

Still he waited. 

"Okay, okay," said Bulma desperately. "I'll give you the chocolate bar if you give me back my ring." She put one hand in her pocket, ready to draw it out, and looked up at him expectantly. 

Vegeta smirked at her. "Well, that sounds tempting…"

Bulma pulled out the chocolate bar, and offered it to him. He considered it for a moment, raising a hand to the ribbon at his neck as if he were about to remove it. He watched her eyes light up with hope, then lowered his hand. "On second thought, I'm not really hungry after all. Maybe some other time." He turned away, ignoring the growls from his stomach. It was worth it to see the look on Bulma's face. 

Bulma dropped her act, her eyes blazing. "Give my ring back, you creep!" She lunged at him, fighting to pry the ring from his hand by force

Vegeta laughed and held it above his head, out of her reach. She snatched at his hand, trying to force his arm down where she could reach it. He grabbed her arm, which was clawing at his face, with his free hand and twisted it on the edge of pain behind her back. She lunged again with her free arm for the ring, and he twisted her arm tighter, forcing a cry of pain from her lips. Her body was jerked against him. Vegeta laughed triumphantly and looked down, startled at how close she was. All at once, he was aware of their position. He could feel the heat of her body as it was pulled flush against his own, like he was burning at her touch. Her face was just inches from him. Her blue eyes looked up at him in fury, but another, unidentifiable emotion was also swirling in the depths. He felt something electric pass between them, and he staggered slightly, as if he had been hit in the stomach. Caught off balance, Vegeta loosened his grip on her, and instantly Bulma twisted out of his arms and darted back a few steps.

Her eyes were watching him warily now, and he could see her try to regain her momentum. 

"Give me back my ring, you loser!" She yelled at him, but her eyes were pools of confusion. Vegeta himself was more shaken then he would like to admit, and fought hard to regain his composure. His body was still tingling from where he had held her. 

"This ring is mine now. I won't give it back, unless you can give me something in return."

He was trying, but the spirit had gone out of it. 

"I don't have to trade for something that is mine," she spat at him. "Give it back to me now!"

Vegeta opened his mouth to reply, then caught a glimpse of her eyes again, seeing the bewilder of emotion still stirring in them. He shut his mouth, swallowing hard to get rid of the lump suddenly in his throat. His body burned, and his head swam dizzily. He scowled at the ground, then abruptly spun on his heel and walked off, leaving Bulma standing still behind him. 

Neither of them noticed the pair of eyes watch them walk away. 

Thank you to faithful reviewers outtadaloop, DBZ-fan-JESS and Lilac Cherry Blossoms. Sorry for the delay in updating, but I have had arguably the worst couple of weeks of my life, and I really don't feel like doing anything but crying. My eight year old brother got really sick and almost died, and I feel like it was my fault cause I was looking after him when he suddenly stopped breathing. My RSA arrived in the mail, but I tore it accidentally, and the stupid government wont send me another one in time. I found out that my boss wants to fire me cause I'm to old (since when is nineteen to old?!) but she cant cause she doesn't have anyone to replace me, and I'm leaving in Feb to go to Uni. anyway. Still upsetting to know though. And to top it all off, I'm fighting with one of my best friends over something really stupid. 

The next update will be sometime soon - that is whenever I get over this emotional stuff I'm wading through at the moment and feel like I can write again. We're over halfway now, so it should be building up to a climax. Can anyone guess where I'm heading with this yet? ^_^


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